


Death Defiance

by purple_bookcover



Category: Hades (Video Game 2018)
Genre: Anal Sex, Angst, Aphrodisiacs, Blood, Bloodplay, Breathplay, Choking, Cock Cages, Cunnilingus, F/M, Hand Jobs, High/drunk sex, Intercrural Sex, Lots of Sex, M/M, Mildly Dubious Consent, Multi, Oral Sex, Orgasm Denial, Pining, Polyamory, Rimming, Somnophilia, aphrodisiac venom, do you have to tag major character death in this fandom cuz like...
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-12
Updated: 2021-01-25
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:40:18
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 12
Words: 36,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26976001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purple_bookcover/pseuds/purple_bookcover
Summary: Or: Fuck Your Way to FreedomThe gods of Olympus will help Zagreus get out of the underworld, but he's going to have to do sexual favors to earn their boons. And they're not the only ones after our hero's sweet booty.
Relationships: Achilles/Patroclus (Hades Video Game), Achilles/Patroclus/Zagreus (Hades Video Game), Achilles/Zagreus (Hades Video Game), Aphrodite/Dionysus, Aphrodite/Dionysus/Zagreus, Ares/Zagreus (Hades Video Game), Asterius | The Minotaur/Theseus (Hades Video Game), Asterius | The Minotaur/Theseus/Zagreus (Hades Video Game), Chaos/Zagreus (Hades Video Game), Dionysus/Zagreus (Hades Video Game), Hypnos/Zagreus (Hades Video Game), Megaera/Zagreus (Hades Video Game), Patroclus/Zagreus (Hades Video Game), Thanatos/Zagreus (Hades Video Game), Zagreus/Aphrodite, Zagreus/Athena, Zagreus/Bone Hydra
Comments: 160
Kudos: 695





	1. Megaera

**Author's Note:**

> Notes:
> 
> \- This will hit "problematic" territory very quickly  
> \- **I had to label this non-con due to chapter 7 in particular. Read the warning on that chapter if you are concerned**  
>  \- Overarching Than/Zag/Meg, but Zagreus is gonna fuck everyone. Buckle up  
> \- Tags will update as we go along. Each chapter will have specific information about CWs/kinks  
> \- Chapter title is who he fucks that time  
> \- **Spoilers:** If you haven't escaped at least once, there are probably some spoilers. But you don't need to have escaped 10+ times for this fic.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zagreus means to say goodbye to Thanatos, but every time they're together they don't seem to do much talking... 
> 
> Later, he meets Megaera in Tartarus, who is much less ... gentle about his plans to escape the underworld.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW in chapter 1 for … uh … sexy dying? and breathplay.

Curled up in bed, his head on Thanatos’s bare chest, Zagreus could almost believe he belonged here. He was warm and content, drowsy in a way he rarely experienced during his endless existence. If there could be peace in his father’s realm, Thanatos’s bare skin against his was the very definition of it. 

He’d asked Thanatos here to talk, not fuck, but that never lasted long. Within minutes they’d settled on the bed, fingers tangling. 

It’d always been like this, some fragile attempt at conversation that meandered off course into accidental touches, wandering eyes, barely suppressed smirks. Then Zagreus’s gut would tighten, his body going hot, his stomach clenching with anticipation. There would be mouths and hands, rasping breaths brushing over hot skin frantically bared, bodies thrown against walls to stop the momentum before they gave in and tumbled back onto the bed. 

It was a fever, an urgent madness. Zagreus’s mouth retraced past mistakes, past conversations gone breathy and incoherent, just as this one had, just as they all had. Then the spaces between them shrank, until they were one writhing, clutching body, their voices as intertwined by passionate pleas as their bodies were.

Every time, Zagreus swore he would resist; every time, he did not. Even the memory of Thanatos inside him made him ache with yearning all over again. 

Thanatos’s chuckle rumbled beneath Zagreus’s cheek. 

“Ready to go again already?” Thanatos said. “Even for beings like us, that’s impressive, Zag.” 

His arm was around Zagreus. Thanatos squeezed him tighter for a moment, kissing the top of his head.

“I hate to admit it, but I might need a bit of a rest after that last round,” Thanatos said. “‘The little death,’ indeed, and I should know.” 

Zagreus laughed. It was so rare to hear Than so light, so unburdened. Zagreus cringed as he contemplated shattering that. Yet it was why he’d come here. The words that had been swallowed by kisses and drowned out by moans were still lodged in his chest, waiting for the right moment. 

“It’s not that,” Zagreus said.

Thanatos must have heard the shift in his tone. His arm tensed around Zagreus. 

Zagreus swallowed, digging for those words trapped in his chest. He had to say it. There was no point being here otherwise. He’d put this off for as long as he could, but the pressure was building. Thanatos probably wouldn’t even be surprised. Zagreus knew his father already had his suspicions. This was a mere formality. 

“You’re leaving,” Thanatos said. 

Zagreus should have explained. He should have expelled the confession huddled around his heart. He should have told Thanatos how much he needed this, how inevitable it was, how desperately important it was. 

“I’m sorry,” he said instead. 

Thanatos did not ask for an explanation. He did not say anything, not for the rest of the night, not even when they died that little death together a second time.

#

That had been months ago, years, perhaps. Time was strange down here, but Zagreus knew the distance had been long and unkind. He hadn’t seen Thanatos again and he hadn’t dared to ask. It would be cruelty for cruelty’s sake.

Instead, he trained as long and as hard as Achilles would indulge him. He worked every moment he could, growing bolder as the truth of his intentions became a secret well-known among the denizens of the House of Hades. 

Then, he ran.

#

He was still running now.

Zagreus panted before the door of the final chamber of Tartarus. He might not have known it was the final chamber, aside from the skull affixed above the door.

“Father always did have an eye for subtlety, didn’t he?” Zagreus muttered. 

He’d come this far on his own, with nothing but his sword and raw determination. No one had helped him along the way, not a single tormented soul in this accursed place, but Zagreus could not say he was proud of that. He was ragged and bleeding. He set his palm against the door, but lingered there, bracing himself for whatever lay beyond. Achilles said he was ready, but in that moment he truly questioned his teacher’s confidence.

The door shifted of its own accord. Zagreus had no choice but to follow, stepping forward into the darkness beyond.

The room he entered loomed cavernous around him. He paced in slowly, the hairs on his arms prickling. Columns marched in two long rows along the periphery of the chamber. If there was anything adorning the cold stone walls, he could not pick it out among the darkness. 

He knew she’d be here even before her boots echoed through the chamber. 

“So, you made it,” Megaera said. She unwound her whip, letting it trail to the floor. Her single leathery wing flexed. 

“Meg,” he said.

She stepped closer, hips swaying with her approach. Her whip dragged along the ground, but that didn’t make it any less threatening. “Turn back. Go home, Zagreus.”

“I can’t do that.”

“I think you will find that you can and must.”

She glared at him, cracking the whip against the stone. It sent twin shivers through him, fear and anticipation both, sweet memories clashing against the stark threat of her body language. 

Perhaps she remembered, as well. Perhaps that flicker at the corner of her scowl was more than it appeared. 

Either way, she did not waver. Zagreus only just had time to dodge out of the way as she screeched and dashed forward. 

He rolled to his feet, but a second later dodged again as Megaera flew across the room at him. Her attack missed him, but struck one of the pillars, sending stone tumbling down in a thunderous cascade. 

“Aid me,” she called.

Shades oozed up out of the floor, beasts of the underworld rushing to her command. 

“Shit.” Zagreus barely had time to bite out a curse before projectiles flashed toward him. He dodged, but this time it wasn’t away. He dashed closer to the beasts Megaera had summoned, cutting them down as quickly as he could. 

They shrieked as they fell, leaving him with only Megaera again, but he stumbled even as the last one faded away. They’d done their jobs and left him reeling, leaning on his sword to steady himself. 

The next time Megaera lunged at him, he did not dodge. He could not.

She grabbed him by the throat mid-dash, slamming him against a wall. Zagreus winced but could not even manage to scream as she lifted him off his feet, pinning him against the wall and crushing the breath out of him. 

“Why?” she said. “Why are you doing this? Why are you making _me_ do this?”

He could not manage to choke out a response. She released him and he slumped to the floor, gasping in a rattling breath. His head was light from the momentary lack of air. It felt lighter still when Megaera crouched down over him. 

“You know if you do this I have no choice,” she said. “I have to meet you here. I have to try to stop you.”

“I know,” he managed. 

“Yet you will not cease this madness?” 

He shook his head.

“Damn it, Zag. Why?” 

He swallowed. It burned his ravaged throat, but he owed her at least this much. “I’m sorry, Meg. I really am.” 

She watched him for a moment, terrifyingly still, face unreadable. Then she lunged, pressing him against the wall again, this time with her mouth. Zagreus could do little but endure as she climbed into his lap, still smothering his mouth with hers. He set his hands on her hips, moaning against her. 

She broke away panting for breath. “Zag, don’t ask this of me. Please.” 

“I have to.” 

“He will make me come here every time. I will kill you over and over and over.”

“I know,” he said.

“Then my sisters will come and they will not be so gentle.” 

He shuddered at that. One word he’d never use for Megaera, inside the bedroom or otherwise, was “gentle.” That had been the impetus of their heated affair and he hadn’t regretted it for a moment, not until now at least. The type of violence she promised here was not the sort mingled with pleasure. 

“Do whatever you must, Meg,” he said. “I understand, but I must see her. I must reach the surface and see my mother.”

“I know,” she said, stroking a hand along his face. “Have you told Thanatos?”

“Not the details, but...” 

“I see. You know he will take it even harder.”

Zagreus’s whole chest clenched. “I do.” 

“I’m merely doing my job, but for Than...”

“For Than it’s personal,” Zagreus said. “I know. Believe me, I know.” 

“Oh, Zag,” she said. 

She kissed him more gently this time, hands cradling his jaw. He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her in close. 

“I have to kill you now,” she said. 

“I know.”

“Get stronger.”

“I will.”

She kissed him again, swifter but no less soft, then wrapped her whip around his neck. He should have fought it, but he couldn’t, not least of all because of the way her thighs trapped him under her. Even as he began to choke, she rolled her hips atop him, kissing him as the breath squeezed out of his throat. 

“Zag,” she moaned, grinding down harder. 

His hands wandered down to her ass, gripping her even as she clutched his shoulder to press down against him. 

He couldn’t resist a parting shot. 

“Technically,” he choked, “not doing … your job.” 

Her mouth trailed to his neck, where she sucked and bit, sharp, bright pain to contrast the steady pulse of his thinning breath. He wondered if those marks might linger after he crawled out of the Styx. 

“If you die,” she said, “I’ll have still done my job.” 

Hard to refute that, not least of all because that whip was so tight around his neck, even as she lifted onto her knees to fumble with their clothing. Zagreus got a brief reprieve when she shimmied out of her pants and tugged his leggings down. The breath he drew was sweet and cool, but raked down his throat. He hardly realized Megaera was stroking him until she squeezed. 

“Don’t die yet,” she said. “I have uses for you.” 

Then she went on stroking, getting him hard, rubbing her thumb over the head to smear a bead of pre-cum down his length. Even knowing what she was about to do, he moaned, hips arching up into her hold. 

Or perhaps he moaned _because_ he knew what she was about to do. 

The whip tightened, strangling the air out of him. He gasped into the sensation, head tilting back. Her free hand gripped his shoulder as she stood up on her knees. She let go to position his cock at her entrance, grinding down until it pressed inside her. 

Their voices intertwined as the heat and pressure closed around them. Megaera worked her way down him until she was almost sitting in his lap, yet the hand tugging the whip tight never relented. 

Zagreus reached blindly for her. Spots of color obscured his vision, but he managed to find her hips. His fingers dug in as he helped her rock atop him, swaying up and down his cock. She set her own pace, bucked as hard as she liked, and he groaned in gratitude. 

The lack of air was making him feel light. He could have floated out of that seated position beneath her, though he desperately wanted to stay tethered to the stone at least a little longer. He knew he wouldn’t last very long, but each moment of her hot and tight around him, pounding down onto his cock, jolted his whole body with shocks of pleasure. 

“Fuck, you’re good,” she rasped. 

He wasn’t sure how much he was actually contributing to that assessment, what with Megaera both riding and choking him, but Zagreus wasn’t inclined to complain. The combination of her pussy tight around his cock and her whip tight around his throat shoved him to a delirious high, a plane trembling on the verge of life and death. He knew any moment it would be too much and his body would succumb, but every second until then was a new landscape of sensation, a dazzling, sparking, brilliant world of overwhelming stimulation. 

She rocked harder. Her body tensed. That made the whip coil tighter, forcing the last sips of air out of his throat. His fingers dug into her skin, even as he wheezed for breath. 

Megaera smashed her lips down onto his mouth, so hard their teeth clacked. Her kiss sucked the last of his air away, even as something gushed warm around his cock. She moaned into his mouth. The sound shivered down his throat, into his chest, warming his whole body, making his cock tremble, pulling everything within him as tight as her whip. 

Zagreus could hardly make sense of his body. He was weightless, drifting away, even as everything pulled in close. His mind meandered off, adrift on a current of pleasure, while every muscle, every bone and tendon and drop of red blood ached and cried out. He couldn’t stand it another moment, neither the pleasure nor the pain. It was going to explode out of him. It was going to annihilate him utterly, leaving behind so little not even the Styx could put him back together. 

Then she jerked the whip, a sharp, brutal tug. 

His neck snapped. 

Zagreus gasped in the warm red water of the Styx, shuddering as he came. 

It took him a moment to realize what had happened, to put together the fractured pieces of his ravaged body into something coherent. He was in the Styx. He was alive again, as alive as anyone got down here. His cum was also somewhere in the river, absorbing into the thick water. 

Zagreus lingered there, only his head above the surface, sucking in breath after breath through a throat rebuilt and whole. His body still remembered the way the air had scraped and torn, though. An echo of pain burned with each inhale. 

Finally, he crawled out of the river. Zagreus paused on the steps, staying on all fours, watching the water run red as it dripped off his skin and hair. 

As his mind cleared, a new ache replaced the pain of Megaera’s whip. She’d conquered him so easily. It was nothing to her, a game, a job, so easy she could take her pleasure from him in the meantime. 

Was this what he’d betrayed Thanatos for? Was this why he’d left Thanatos? So he could be flicked aside like an insect in the very first layer of Hell? If he couldn’t get past Megaera, he shuddered to imagine what other horrors lay ahead. He’d let himself get distracted and it had turned his escape attempt into an utter failure.

Zagreus clambered to his feet. He was steady despite the ordeal. The main hall of the House of Hades stretched before him: Hypnos asleep with his list of the dead, Cerberus dozing beside Hades’s desk, errant shades drifting through the halls to their tedious tasks.

Nothing had changed. Not a gods damned thing. 

Zagreus scrubbed a hand through his hair. He’d try again. And again. As many times as it took. He’d defeat Meg and whomever else meant to stand in his way. He’d reach the surface, no matter what it cost. 

He owed Thanatos at least that much.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic will update **every other Monday**.
> 
>  **Next time:** Hypnos has a little friendly advice for Zagreus *eyebrow wiggle*
> 
> \---
> 
> I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/purplebookcover) (18+ please).
> 
> I respond to every comment. Thank you, friends!


	2. Hypnos

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zagreus returns to the House of Hades after his encounter with Megaera. Hypnos is his usual snarky self, but it turns out he also has a tantalizing piece of advice. 
> 
> "The Olympians are willing to help you ... for a price."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Somno

Hypnos startled awake when Zagreus paced down the hall. 

“Oh, hey, hi, whoa, didn’t see you there, buddy,” Hypnos said. “Let’s see, Meg got ya, huh? Wow, what a way to die.” 

Zagreus’s throat felt tight at the mere memory. The Styx could put him back together, but it was not the Lethe, it could not undo the memory. That memory made his neck feel like it was faintly burning. Zagreus rubbed at it absently. 

“Yeah,” he said. “It was swell.” 

“Aw, don’t be sad, big guy,” Hypnos said. “You’ll get her next time. Or you won’t, which might be just as fun.” Hypnos winked, big and obvious, and Zagreus rolled his eyes. 

“Right,” he grumbled, starting away. 

Hypnos hurried after him, still floating, that cape-like bedding he wore flowing around him. 

“Hey, don’t be sad, Zag,” Hypnos said. “I’m sure you’ll get past her eventually.”

“I’m not really in the mood for a pep talk right now, Hypnos.” 

“Right.” 

Hypnos quieted, but kept following Zagreus, even as he entered the lounge and settled onto one of the plush red cushions against the wall. A picture of Megaera hung on the wall across from him. “Featured House Servant.” He groaned, tilting his head back and sinking into the cushions. 

Hypnos settled beside him, his own red chiton and cape blending into the lounge’s seating. It made the god look impossibly small among all that billowing bedding. 

“Do you want something?” Zagreus said. It was a bit harsh, but he wasn’t really in the mood to be nice, especially to someone who taunted him every time he crawled out of that damn river. 

“Well, sort of,” Hypnos started. 

He went silent when a shade drifted over carrying Zagreus’s favorite drink. Zagreus offered a few of the coins he’d collected during his jaunt through his father’s kingdom and the shade wandered to the next patron. 

Zagreus sipped. The sharp bite of the intoxicant spread a pleasant burn down his throat and into his belly. It took some of the edge off the whole ordeal, at least until Hypnos spoke again.

“I do happen to know something that might help you,” Hypnos said.

Zagreus glanced over at him. Hypnos was lying on his side, head propped up on a hand. His soft white curls fell around his face, framing the impish grin stretching his mouth wide. 

“Oh yeah?” Zagreus said. “And whatever might that be?” 

He had little faith in Hypnos actually coming through on this, but it didn’t hurt to ask, right? Hypnos was a god, as easy as it was to forget that. Who knew? Maybe there was some little kernel of information he had that could actually help.

Hypnos looked around like the other guests in the lounge might overhear him. He leaned in close, so close Zagreus could see the bags under his eyes. 

“I’ve heard the Olympians might be keen to help you out,” Hypnos said.

Zagreus blinked at that, nearly choking on his drink. He gulped down the alcohol before replying. “What? Where did you hear that? How?” 

“Shhh,” Hypnos hissed. “Just a little something I overhead, OK?”

“Well,” Zagreus said, “well how do I contact them? How do get this alleged help?” 

“Oh, you don’t contact them.” Hypnos jabbed a finger at Zagreus’s chest. “They contact you.” 

“When? How?”

Hypnos shrugged. “All I know is that when you leave this house, you might get a messenger or two. I’d suggest you heed the call, eh?” 

“Yes. Yes, of course.” 

A quiver rang through Zagreus. Help from the Olympians. It was more than he could have possibly imagined. He might actually have a chance at reaching the surface if Olympus took an interest in aiding him. 

But this was all far too optimistic. The gods of Olympus did nothing for free. Even the mortals knew that much. 

“What’s their price?” 

Hypnos smirked. “You’re a smart one.”

“What is it, Hypnos? Just tell me. What do they plan to demand of me?” 

“Well, about that...” Hypnos glanced around again, smirk curling. “I think they might want to get to know you a little better, if you know what I mean.” Hypnos wiggled his eyebrows to punctuate the statement.

“You … you can’t be serious.” 

Hypnos finally eased back, shrugging. “Hey, what’s in that cup?” He snatched it and took a drink, immediately coughing. “Woof. Strong stuff. Might need a bit of this for what they have planned for you out there, kiddo.” 

Every bit of red blood drained out of Zagreus’s face. 

“You’re joking,” he said. “This is a trick or a game of some sort.”

“Afraid it’s not, bud,” Hypnos said. “That’s the hot gossip.” 

Zagreus jolted to his feet, the drink forgotten as he stormed out of the lounge and toward his room. He needed to be alone. He needed to think about this. It couldn’t possibly be real. It was secondhand at best anyway. Hypnos didn’t know anything. Who would tell _Hypnos_ something like this? Definitely not the Olympians, so it had to be someone in the house who could get to the Olympians. That left few options. Charon, he supposed. Shades sometimes moved between levels of the underworld, but the gods of Olympus surely weren’t divulging their secrets to shades. 

Thanatos. Thanatos could move how he willed, could get all the way to the surface if he wanted. But why would they tell Thanatos? And why would Thanatos tell _Hypnos_?

No, it still just did not make sense. Zagreus charged into his private chambers muttering to himself and rubbing at the headache threatening to grow behind his eyes. 

He gasped when he turned and found Hypnos still following. 

“What in all the underworld are you doing here?” Zagreus said. 

“Hey, I know this wasn’t exactly the happy news you were looking for but it’s not so bad, right?” Hypnos said. “It might not even be correct. What would I know? No one really tells me this kind of stuff.”

“They did this time, supposedly.” 

“OK, well, that’s true, but they just wanted to help you, I promise.” 

“Help me.” Zagreus scoffed. “Help me. They sure have a strange idea of helping me. So what am I supposed to do, huh? Fuck my way through the underworld.”

“Well, I mean, it’s better than the alternative,” Hypnos said.

“Which is?” 

“Crawling out of that river over and over.” 

Zagreus sighed and settled on his bed. Hypnos wafted over to sit beside him and patted at his shoulder. 

“It might be fun,” Hypnos said. “Can you imagine if Aphrodite decides to help? Or Ares? Or--”

“Hypnos.” 

Hypnos clacked his mouth shut, but Zagreus was already struggling not to smile. He shook his head. This was so, so absurd. He should have expected as much though. Of course they wanted some sort of price. As prices went, it wasn’t even a terrible one. It could be a _great_ one, in the right circumstances. 

Even as Zagreus contemplated what earning Dionysus’s boon might be like, worry prickled at his mind. Could he even _survive_ sex with an Olympian god? He hadn’t survived sex with a fury, so he didn’t have much hope for the likes of Artemis and Athena and – gods, what would Chaos be like? Could even the Olympians make it through that? 

Maybe he wouldn’t need to risk it that much. He could just get through whomever found him first and see how far that got him.

Even as he thought it he knew it wasn’t true. The next time Zagreus made his escape, he’d have to survive the underworld and gods alike. Gods damned gods and their gods damned prices. 

Speaking of which...

“Why are you telling me this?” Zagreus said. 

Hypnos was sprawled out on his bed, cozy and drowsy. “Hm? Oh, no reason.”

“Oh no,” Zagreus said. “There is always a reason. There is always a price.” 

He rolled over, placing his arms on either side of Hypnos and looming over him. Hypnos’s eyes went a little wider, more alert than Zagreus usually saw him. 

“This is a test, right?” Zagreus said. “You’re the first one? I’m supposed to ‘earn’ this information from you?”

“N-no,” Hypnos squeaked.

“I don’t believe you,” Zagreus said. 

He swept down, pressing his lips against Hypnos’s. He tasted a note of actual surprise there. Strange, but it didn’t do much to dissuade him. 

Still, when he pulled back, Hypnos’s gray skin was flushed with pink. 

“Zag, honestly, I’m just the messenger,” Hypnos said. 

“A messenger who doggedly followed me back to my chambers, hm?”

“I had to … make sure,” Hypnos said. 

“Right.” 

Zagreus lowered his mouth again, kissing along Hypnos’s neck this time. Hypnos gasped as his lips pressed against a sensitive spot. His hands grappled at Zagreus’s shoulders, body arching up. 

“Seriously,” Hypnos gasped. “Z-Zag, I just-I just wanted to h-help. You don’t need to--”

Zagreus pushed up, pressing a finger to Hypnos’s lips. “Maybe you are just here to help. Maybe you’re full of shit. I could use the distraction either way, though, so perhaps you should just shut up and stay right there while I fuck you.” 

When Zagreus removed his finger, Hypnos’s mouth hung open, but he did not speak. A thin breath escaped, part sigh, part gasp. Hypnos’s eyelids fluttered, but he nodded, cheeks burning. 

“That’s better,” Zagreus said. 

He started to work his way down, but the sheer amount of fabric Hypnos wore made it a challenge just to get to more skin. Zagreus had to sit back and undo the belt cinching his chiton before he could get the garment and cape loose. 

Zagreus shimmied all the way down to Hypnos’s feet to push the clothing up. His fingertips grazed smooth skin as he went, skin cool as dusk. Hypnos’s thighs and torso were dusted with darker spots, like stars in a night sky, only they drank in the light instead of providing any. 

Hypnos sat up to help get the chiton off over his head, a rare bit of effort for him, but this seemed like an exceptional day in every possible way. 

Even Zagreus got to feel large beside the god of sleep. He wasn’t especially short, but his limbs were slender as willow branches, collar bones prominent as he drew in a shivering breath. Hypnos’s fingers played along the edge of Zagreus’s belt. 

“Aren’t you going to also?” Hypnos said. He gnawed at his lip. His eyes had become sharp, glinting golden as he appraised Zagreus up and down. 

“Not going to help?” Zagreus said.

“It would be against my very nature.”

Zagreus rolled his eyes. “Of course.” But he took off his belt and dispensed with the rest of his clothing about as quickly as he could. Now that this was actually happening, and potentially not just with Hypnos but half the damn pantheon, Zagreus found himself far less put off by the concept than he should have been. 

Hypnos’s body was beautiful, slim and smooth, teasing little freckles splashed here and there. Zagreus forgot his anxieties about the challenge before him as he kissed along the swell of a thigh and over the curve of a hip bone. Maybe some of the other gods would be less … accommodating, but he knew Hypnos. This was long overdue, in truth. 

Zagreus kissed his way between Hypnos’s thighs, spreading his legs so he could lick at Hypnos’s rim. Hypnos shivered at the first touch of Zagreus’s tongue, a giddy laugh bubbling out. Zagreus was determined to turn that laughter into something else as he dug in. 

There was something inherently sweet about Hypnos, mellow and cool but faintly sweet all the same. He had no right being so tasty, with all those snide smiles and disinterested gazes. Yet Zagreus was moaning more than Hypnos as he lapped him open. 

Zagreus switched to his fingers, lest he linger too long. It gave him an opportunity to gaze up at Hypnos, who was chewing at his bottom lip, those golden eyes still sharp with mirth. The color in Hypnos’s cheeks gave him a blush of life that contradicted his nature, but there was something beautiful about that, like how mortals described the sunrise. 

“You don’t need to be so delicate about it, Zaggy,” Hypnos said. 

Zagreus didn’t think he was, but apparently Hypnos had an appetite that went beyond the ordinary. Zagreus dove to the side of the bed, digging around for the oil he kept under it. Even gods needed a little help now and then. 

He slicked up his finger and pushed at Hypnos, but Hypnos shook his head.

“If you keep warming me up I’ll die of boredom,” Hypnos said.

“I’m being considerate,” Zagreus said.

Hypnos rolled his eyes. “Be considerate and fuck me already.” 

Zagreus bit back grumbles and retorts. Gods, Hypnos liked to frustrate. Zagreus set those thoughts aside and concentrated instead on slicking up his cock and Hypnos’s ass. He even spared a moment to pump Hypnos’s flushed cock. It was better than the little shit deserved, but Zagreus could not deny the effect those whiny little moans had on him as Hypnos squirmed in his hold. 

By the time he lined up against Hypnos’s hole, he was aching to get inside. He pushed, perhaps rushing the process a little, but as Hypnos’s heat clenched tight around him Zagreus let out a sigh that felt like it’d been trapped in his chest for entire ages of mankind. 

He kept pushing, driving as deep as he could go. Hypnos yielded around him, almost absurdly ready to take him. 

Zagreus soon saw why. 

Hypnos had gone entirely limp on his dick, his eyes shut, mouth slightly parted. He was deeply, deeply asleep. 

Zagreus paused, but it was not for Hypnos’s sake. He propped himself up on a hand, slapping lightly at Hypnos’s face with the other.

“H-hey, hey, Hypnos, are you...” 

“Mmm,” Hypnos murmured.

“Hypnos...” 

One golden eye creaked open just enough for Hypnos to glare at Zagreus. “Why did you stop?” Hypnos said, sleep thick in his voice.

“You … you passed out.” 

“I’m the god of sleep. What do you want?”

“But I … Do I just...”

Even with only half an eye open, Hypnos managed to look utterly disgusted and exasperated. “Yes. Gods, do you need an instruction manual?” 

Maybe. This was … strange didn’t quite cover it. Even as Zagreus pulled back to honor Hypnos’s demand, Hypnos arched and fell right back to sleep, his breath deep and even. 

Zagreus thrust cautiously back in, testing the reaction, feeling out this truly bizarre encounter. But it seemed the more Hypnos liked it the more he just … slept. He murmured in his sleep, shifting his hips, moaning a little. 

Zagreus sure hoped the Zagreus in Hypnos’s dreams was doing better than him. He felt like a hapless virgin as he struggled to get his bearings. Did Hypnos always sleep through sex? Was this intentional or just a consequence of his nature? Could he stay awake if he wanted to? Did he like this? Zagreus had utterly no idea, but Hypnos’s body was still yielding around him, welcoming him in with every push. He had little choice but to keep going, planting his hands on the bed to thrust in harder. 

He managed a steady beat. The heat gripping his dick gradually wore away his anxieties, pulling him down into a state he could only describe as dream-like. He didn’t even realize he’d closed his eyes until he squeezed them more tightly shut, groaning as Hypnos clenched around him. 

Hypnos’s own moans were quiet, muffled by sleep, but they started to spike higher, taking on a whiny tone. Hypnos was swaying with every smack of Zagreus’s body, shifting his hips every time Zagreus plunged back into him. 

The world behind Zagreus’s eyes exploded with color, too much color. This wasn’t merely spots from closing his eyes too tightly. This was whole worlds, sparks and flares and explosions of multi-colored light. Some even took on vague shapes: This one a bird, that one a snake, that one a beast of the underworld. 

Zagreus lost track of his body as the images swept over him, dragging his mind away. He felt numb, even as he pounded harder into the body jolting beneath him. There was nothing left but heat and sound and color. It was almost like those first moments of consciousness after returning to the Styx, but full of so much _more_. The Styx never showed him whole universes and constellations. It never recreated the verdant sprawl of Elysium. It never pulled him into the boiling waters of Asphodel and set his whole body ablaze in the consuming fire. 

He gasped, thrown abruptly back into his body. It hit him like a slap and suddenly he was coming, spilling uncontrollably inside Hypnos, his body threatening to shatter if every last drop didn’t blast out of him _now_. 

Zagreus could do little but moan and jerk and endure until every beat of it eventually passed. Then he held still, able to do nothing but pant and pry his eyes back open. 

He found Hypnos smirking beneath him, cum splattered over his chest. His own cum, Zagreus dearly hoped, because Zagreus had been utterly incapable of seeing to Hypnos’s needs in the thrall of whatever the hell that just was. 

Hypnos reached a hand up, patting endearingly at Zagreus’s cheek. 

“See?” he said. “Told ya it’d be fine, Zaggy.” 

Zagreus huffed, unable to reply just yet, and eased out of Hypnos, who almost immediately turned over and cuddled up in Zagreus’s bed. In the time it took for Zagreus to clamber onto quivering legs and clean himself up, Hypnos seemed to be fast asleep under the sheets. 

Zagreus sighed, planting his hands on his hips. 

“At a minimum, you’re going to let me clean you up so you don’t get cum all over my sheets,” Zagreus said. 

Hypnos murmured in his sleep, but did not protest as Zagreus cleaned him up and shimmied into the bed beside him. If this was how the rest of his effort to get free of the underworld was going to go, Zagreus had a _very_ long road ahead of him.

He prepared to sleep and try to forget his task for the moment, but as he did Hypnos shuffled until his back was pressed against Zagreus’s chest. Zagreus had little choice but to put an arm around Hypnos and hold him close while they slept. 

It was better not to fight the will of the gods.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic updates every other Monday. Next update Nov. 9.
> 
>  **Next time:** Zagreus returns to Tartarus and encounters his first Olympic god. Whose sex trial will he endure? 
> 
> \---
> 
> I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/purplebookcover) (18+ please).
> 
> I respond to every comment. Thank you, friends!


	3. Athena

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The first boon is from Athena. She demands a painfully pleasurable price.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Cock cage. Orgasm denial. She uses the word "cousin" IDGAF

Zagreus stepped out of the House of Hades and into Tartarus. He clutched Varatha, the Eternal Spear, its dual prongs glinting and sharp. 

A golden shield hung in the air, wreathed in ethereal light. 

Zagreus took a deep breath and approached. This was it. The trial began now.

The shield hummed, vibrating the air. He could feel the call thrumming from that golden herald. 

“In the name of Hades! Olympus! I accept this message.” 

The humming rose to a roar. The goddess Athena herself emerged from a shower of light that burst bright in the gloom of Tartarus. Even her armor was gold, from the breastplate to the great shield she carried. A long blue plume flowed from her golden helm. 

She smiled, faint but detectable. “We must get you out of this miserable place. I’ll see that all of us upon Olympus do our part, beginning here with me.”

Zagreus swallowed. “Athena, I could not possibly--”

“Hush,” she cut in. “Will you accept my boon?”

This was it. Now or never. “Yes,” Zagreus said. “Yes, I accept.”

Athena lowered to the ground, her light dimming faintly as her feet touched the stone of Tartarus. She paced forward, steps soft in the quiet before the twisted chambers awaiting Zagreus. Athena extended her hand. Zagreus expected to see some sigil or sign, but the goddess simply made her offer. Her cool fingers brushed along Zagreus’s face so she could cup his jaw. 

“Are you sure?” she said.

Her voice had quieted, yet it still echoed, ageless, timeless, unbound to any realm. It reverberated through Zagreus as she drew close, watching him, those cool eyes sending chills rippling down his spine. 

Zagreus hesitated. This should have been an easy question. Who would not accept the boon of the Goddess of Wisdom herself? Certainly, whatever advice or help she had to give would be invaluable. Surely, it was more foolish _not_ to heed her call. Yet he knew what lurked beneath that simple offer.

“Yes,” he said. 

Athena’s smiled ticked up. Those cold eyes sent ice through Zagreus’s veins. This was the correct decision. It had to be the correct decision. So why did dread sit so heavy in his stomach?

He was still wondering when Athena kissed him. 

It was breathtaking. Literally. When her cool blue lips pressed against his, all the air left his lungs, sucked out in a gasp. She drew back after only a moment and Zagreus swayed, light headed.

“My, if you nearly topple at a kiss, I fear how you shall fare by the time I’ve finished with you,” Athena said.

She was not alone in that fear, yet as she stepped away and her armor started to fade out, revealing more and more bare skin every moment, fear slipped to the back of Zagreus’s mind. Soon, the goddess stood naked before him and Zagreus could do little more than gape. She was lean and strong. When she stepped toward him, her thighs flexed even as her hips swayed. 

She strode up to Zagreus matter-of-factly, setting a finger under his chin to tilt his gaze up. “Well, shall we begin, then?”

His clothes vanished in a gasp. She did not tear or tug. One moment he was dressed for his battle through the underworld and then next he was stark naked before her. Athena smiled, a slight quirk of blue lips, then drew him in for a scorching kiss. 

His body reacted instantly. A little trepidation wasn’t going to be a match for the heat of a goddess’s kiss, for the feel of her hands on his face, for the press of her body crowding in close to his. He knew Athena could feel his excitement plainly. She reached down for it, stroking him. Every motion she made was practiced and precise, even in a time like this. She moved like a warrior, like someone who didn’t waste words or energy for even the smallest indulgences. That must have meant this was absolutely necessary, then, an inevitability neither of them could avoid. 

Her hand on his cock tightened. Zagreus moaned into the extra pressure. Then it tightened more still, until he felt encased in her hold. 

She set both hands on his face, forcing him to look at her again. “You must learn restraint, dear cousin,” Athena said.

He blinked, confused. There was still pressure on his cock, pleasant, but getting rather tight and constricting in all honesty.

“Even in moments such as these, we might extract valuable lessons,” Athena said. 

Her hands were still along his jaw, holding him steady. But … but she was also gripping his cock, gripping and squeezing. 

Zagreus jerked back and looked down. His partially-hard dick was encased in something he could feel more than see. A shimmer of gold surrounded his cock, not unlike Athena’s golden shield and armor, yet this was insubstantial, transparent. Zagreus could see his cock through the sheen of gold, yet when he reached for it he could not touch himself. Some barrier kept him back, the same barrier that was squeezing him tight. 

Athena lowered to her knees before him, taking him by the hips. She leaned forward. Her mouth and tongue somehow found the gaps in that invisible barrier. She sucked at him, tongue darting out to paint hot stripes along his aching cock. 

Zagreus sucked in a breath, reaching for her instinctively, but thinking better of it at the last moment. The heat of her mouth threatened to get him even harder, even though he knew the golden contraption would hinder and punish him. 

Athena looked up, golden eyes ablaze, and Zagreus shuddered. Is this what she meant by “valuable lessons?” What exactly was Zagreus meant to learn here, how much he could simultaneously be in pain and bliss? 

Her mouth came away with a wet pop. “Very good,” Athena said, rising. 

She put her hands on his shoulders and for an instant Zagreus thought she might actually be doing it to steady him, but then she pushed and he was the one going to his knees. 

Zagreus waited, gazing up at the goddess. His cock attempted to twitch and he winced at the sensation of pressure around him. Despite it all, looking up the long, lean, muscled length of Athena’s body had Zagreus swallowing down waves of arousal that threatened to make the cage around his dick unbearably tight.

Athena left her hands on Zagreus’s shoulders as she hunched over him, looming. Zagreus didn’t see her bring her foot up, but he certainly felt it. She stepped lightly against the golden contraption, adding an extra beat of pressure that made Zagreus moan and bite at his bottom lip. He knew he was flushed, practically panting as Athena stepped on him. 

She watched him, looking curious and impassive more than anything else. It was excruciating, the full force of that penetrating gaze clashing against his attempt not to get any harder from it. Zagreus felt like he was losing this particular battle. Even biting his lip hard enough to draw blood, having Athena’s foot on his cock, her eyes boring demands into him, was an enticement Zagreus’s body could not refuse. 

She started to move her foot, rubbing slowly up and down. He felt it against his bare cock – not everywhere, only in the seemingly random gaps in the cage. Athena’s foot made the whole device move a little, almost like it was a hand wrapped around him, stroking him. 

Zagreus swallowed down his moans. Gods, how was he supposed to endure this? 

“A-Athena, please, I...” 

“If you cannot bear this, Zagreus, how do you mean to escape your father’s realm?”

She was right. Some little shred of his mind that was still sane and whole knew she was right. But just now that tiny voice was being drowned out by a cacophony screaming at him to just let go, to give in to the pulsing need within him. 

“I... I don’t...” He tried to respond, but he couldn’t even keep his eyes open as she kept rubbing her foot over him. 

“Come now, noble cousin,” Athena said. “Just a little more. I have faith in you.” Her voice dipped down, going both quieter and lower, like a panther purring at him.

Yet he believed her. When she said it like that, when she squeezed reassurance into his shoulders, even as her foot toyed with him, it made Zagreus truly believe. He drew in a shuddering breath, chest swelling and hitching, and willed himself to endure. 

Her foot relented. Zagreus let out a held breath. He was still uncomfortably hard in the device, but it was a pleasant sort of pressure now. He could feel the pulse of his heartbeat drumming against the cage, but now that he’d eased into the experience it was almost welcome. 

He opened his eyes when he heard Athena moving. She knelt to bring herself closer to his level. Athena held his face in her cool hands, analyzing him with those implacable golden eyes. 

Her thumbs stroked his cheeks as she spoke. “A final test, Zagreus. It will not be easy, but I believe in you.”

A final test? Gods, what could she mean to do to him that she hadn’t already done? How much more was he expected to take?

She pulled him into a kiss. Zagreus remained tense at first, expecting some complication or twist, but after a few moments with nothing but the sweet warmth of her mouth, the tingle of her prodding tongue, the massage of her lips against his, he relaxed. 

That’s when the buzzing began.

It was like a shock of lightning, but much, much smaller and extremely localized. Zagreus murmured against Athena’s mouth, but she just went on holding him. Meanwhile, the golden cage around his cock was vibrating, humming. It was excruciatingly good. 

Zagreus released a moan right into her mouth. The cage was sending tremors of pleasure right into his dick and up his gut. And despite how that cage squeezed and pressed in around him, Zagreus got harder and harder against it. He felt like he might burst out of the restraint as the buzzing went on, but the invisible barrier held fast against his cock’s insistent swelling. 

When Athena pulled back, Zagreus gasped. Moans crawled out of his throat. He couldn’t hold back the sounds any more than he could stop his cock from trying to get harder. 

Athena kept cupping his jaw, observing him as he writhed in her hold, grinding his hips at nothing, eyes watering from dancing along the razor’s edge of pleasure. 

“You’re doing so well,” she said. “You are strong, Zagreus, strong enough for this. Strong enough for far worse than this.” 

It felt to Zagreus like nothing could be worse than this. He dared a glance down. His cock was swollen with blood, pushing out of the tiny gaps in the cage, for all the good that did it. 

He looked away and squeezed his eyes shut, another moan sneaking out between his gritted teeth. 

Athena leaned forward, her forehead against his. She left one hand at his neck, but the other snuck down to his chest, where she squeezed a pec, groping at him while he panted and whined against her. 

“So good, Zagreus,” she said. “You’re so very close.”

“Athena, please, please,” he whined. Tears formed at the corners of his eyes, but he did not attempt to stop them. The blinding pleasure had to get out somehow or he was going to explode. 

Athena’s hand wandered down to the golden cage. It kept on buzzing and she stroked over it. 

Zagreus nearly screamed.

“A-Athena, please, gods, I can’t--”

“Shh,” she said. “You can. You can.”

He whimpered in response, his weight sinking against her. He could taste her breath with each quivering rasp he sucked in. Her forehead was still against his, her skin cool compared to his. The tears sprang free, carving down his cheeks. And just then, just when Zagreus felt he might grind his teeth to dust, might cry in earnest, might shatter into so many pieces not even the Styx could put him back together--

It stopped.

He gasped, eyes flying open. The cage was gone. Just gone. All of a sudden his cock was free, held in Athena’s hand but able to expand at long, long last to full hardness. 

Before Zagreus even knew what to make of this newfound freedom Athena shoved him onto his back. He fell willingly, still delirious as she climbed atop him. Her heat enveloped him. Zagreus arched, crying out. In three quick, powerful jerks of her hips she unraveled him. Zagreus shuddered and shook beneath her, all of that tight, heavy pressure releasing at last, releasing with a joyful cry and gushing flood. 

When it passed, he still trembled, lying beneath Athena, who had her hands pressed against his chest as she straddled him. She seemed unconcerned with the idea of sitting atop him, watching him as coolly as she had throughout the entire strange process. 

Zagreus might have reached for her, but he feared his hand wouldn’t respond if he attempted to move it. He was utterly limp below her, his breaths quivering even as they quieted. 

“Very good, Zagreus,” she said. “Very good. I have high hopes for you.”

He wanted to thank her. It seemed like the right thing to do. Yet his mouth could not manage any words. Everything in him still trembled, reeling from the force of that deliciously delayed orgasm. 

Athena climbed off him. In an instant, she was back in all her regalia, stately and terrifying and beautiful. She smiled down at Zagreus. 

“When you are ready, tell me how I might help you,” Athena said. 

She waited, waited silently and patiently through all the long, long minutes it took for sense and coherence to return to Zagreus’s body. 

“Shield,” he managed. “Protect me.”

“Very well,” Athena said. “A worthy choice, for you cannot fight if you are not wise enough to defend, just as you cannot know joy if you do not know restraint. I will gift you my most powerful shield, a divine dash that will deflect your enemies’s blows. Use it well.”

“I will,” he said. “I will.”

Her smiled broadened. “I have every confidence you will. Well then, I do so hope to see you in Olympus soon. We may yet train more.”

He shivered, but nodded, and the goddess vanished in a flash of gold. 

It took some time before Zagreus found the will to clamber to his feet. His clothing returned as she vanished and he attempted to set it all right, though he doubted it made him look any less destroyed. 

When his head finally cleared and his body recovered, he did indeed notice a surge of fresh strength. Something fortified him, made him feel sturdy and resilient. 

He dashed toward the door at the far end of the room, eager to move on with his mission, and the world flashed gold. 

“Athena’s power,” he said. 

So, it was true what she’d said, she really had given him a shield, a powerful shield. Zagreus allowed himself a surge of hope. Even this one boon would help him tremendously. He felt damn near invincible. Acquiring the shield had been … a trial, but not a terrible trial. A sort of stupendously delightful trial, in fact. 

He could do this, he thought. He could really do this. Maybe he’d snag another boon in Asphodel, but this shield business could probably get him past Megaera even. 

Zagreus opened the door to the next chamber, feeling like he was well on his way to the surface and his mother. Finally.

When he stepped into the next room, he gripped his spear, prepared to face a slew of underworld beasts. But the chamber was empty. Cold stone, the gurgle of the Styx, the door at the far end of the chamber – and absolutely nothing else. 

He paced forward cautiously, expecting monsters to leap out of every shadow and crevice any moment. Yet he made it all the way to the door and still nothing. Nothing at all. 

Zagreus touched the door, but it didn’t shock or repel him. In fact, it didn’t react in the slightest. 

He pushed harder, but the door didn’t budge. 

“Oh, come on,” Zagreus muttered. 

He pushed again and this time the door did finally resist.

Zagreus jerked back as the chamber darkened. The scant light deepened, red bleeding into every corner and shadow. The darkness pushed in, oppressive, looming, threatening. 

Zagreus backed up, but there was nowhere to go. The darkness was everywhere, closing in like a smothering hand. 

A voice boomed, vibrating the air itself.

“Zagreus,” a deep voice rumbled, “did you truly think you could pick one of us and not anger the others, boy? Neutrality is not an option here.” 

A figure started to materialize, the blood-red darkness coalescing into a human form.

“I see you met with my sister,” Ares said. “How foolish you are, to make me jealous.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic updates every other Monday!
> 
>  **Next time:** Ares is a jealous lover.
> 
> \--
> 
> I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/purplebookcover) (18+ please).
> 
> I respond to every comment. Thank you, friends!


	4. Ares

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ares is jealous of Zagreus's escapades with Athena. 
> 
> He takes appropriate action.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **CW:** Blood. A lot of blood. Blood as lube. Blood drinking/licking. It's Ares. He gets off on blood. Literally, this time.

As the red light faded, a man appeared in the chamber. 

“Lord Ares,” Zagreus said, taking an unconscious step back. 

Ares smiled. It was a ghastly gesture on that hard, chiseled face. He was every bit as toned and powerful as his sister, but Ares’s strength loomed where Athena’s stated, dominated where Athena’s protected. 

“It is not wise to tempt my jealousy, Zagreus,” Ares said. 

“I assure you, I never meant--”

“Yet you carry my sister’s shield,” Ares said. “Do not assume I do not know how you obtained it.”

Zagreus swallowed. His back hit a wall, halting his retreat. Ares paced toward him. Even shrunken down to human size, Ares had a way of filling the room, of consuming space with his mere presence. He reached Zagreus, who shrank before him. 

Ares took Zagreus by the chin, turning his head like he was examining a horse. 

“She left no mark upon you,” Ares said. “I will not be so gentle.” 

Zagreus’s mouth went dry. He considered resisting or arguing, but Ares would likely only take that as a further insult. Still, the thought that what Athena had done had been _gentle_ sent a shiver down Zagreus’s spine. A tight, clenching heat answered, a heat that appalled him as much as excited him. 

Ares stepped back and let his helm drop to the ground. He summoned a short, wicked-looking sword. As he ran his fingers along the edge, a curl of red smoke rose, like blood wafting off the blade. 

“Tell me, my kin, how might I aid you?”

Zagreus struggled to find the breath to speak. “Aid me?”

“Of course,” Ares said. “That is the nature of our interaction here, is it not? You bring me red blood--” He scanned up and down Zagreus’s body, mouth curling as he appraised “--and I bestow gifts so you may cut your way to the surface. In truth, I will enjoy watching your rampage nearly as much as I will enjoy having you earn my gifts. Your capacity for violence is … thrilling.” 

“Thrilling” was not the word Zagreus would have selected. He was only doing what he had to. If his father would simply get out of his way, there would be no need for all this fighting. Until then, however, Zagreus had to keep cutting through his enemies.

And Ares could help him do it.

Athena now protected him, but he could not prevail with defense alone. He had strike back at the hordes Hades planned to send his way. No one could help him with that task more effectively than Ares.

“Yes,” Zagreus said. “Yes, I need your aid, if you see fit to bestow it.”

Ares snorted something like a laugh. “Come, help me out of my armor.” 

Zagreus hesitated. That was not at all the request he’d expected, but Ares merely stood before him, waiting. 

Zagreus walked around him, searching for the clasps on his armor. The shoulders connected to the breastplate, all the straps coming together around the sides. Zagreus moved to Ares’s side and started picking at the leather. Ares lifted an arm so Zagreus could undo the straps and loosen the armor before pulling it off over Ares’s head.

The entire process was … bizarre. Surely, Ares could just whisk away his armor as Athena had. Yet Zagreus had to go through the ordeal bit by bit, setting the white and gold breastplate aside before starting to loosen the straps at Ares’s hips to do away with his armored pteruges.

Even wearing nothing but a plain chiton, Ares cut an intimidating figure. He no longer held that frightening blade, but muscle corded across his chest and down his arms. His thighs flexed merely from Ares shuffling his feet. The cloth of his chiton stretched over power Zagreus could not yet glimpse. 

“Thank you, my kin,” Ares said. 

“Oh, yeah, sure, it’s--”

Ares moved so quickly Zagreus didn’t even realize what happened until he was on his back on the ground. The stone nearly knocked the breath from his lungs when he hit it. Ares was on top of him, grappling for his limbs, sitting heavy on his torso. 

Zagreus reacted on instinct, struggling to free anything he might. He slipped a wrist out of Ares’s hold. The sudden jerky motion meant his arm kept moving, flailing until it struck something.

Zagreus froze, eyes flying wide. He stopped his struggling, going almost limp beneath Ares, who was touching the side of his head where Zagreus punched him. 

Ares dabbed at his skin, but there was no blood. Still, he examined his fingers, a slow, crooked smile seeping across his face. 

When he looked back down at Zagreus, his eyes gleamed, sharp as his blade.

“Your blood will be so beautiful, my kin,” he said.

Zagreus’s heart stopped dead in his chest. He waited for the Styx to drag him under, but it was only Ares dragging him around now, laughing madly as he grappled with Zagreus. 

They rolled across the floor of the chamber. Zagreus fought on pure instinct, spurred on by animalistic fear. He had no idea what Ares meant to do to him or what Ares even wanted from all this, but he knew it wouldn’t be pleasant. 

Ares rolled them over and for an instant Zagreus thought he might be able to pin the god down. Then powerful thighs wrapped around Zagreus’s waist and he flipped over again, landing on his back with a grunt. 

While Zagreus yet lay stunned, Ares dove at his neck, tearing away his pauldron and flinging it across the room. Ares nearly ripped the fabric of Zagreus’s chiton dragging it off his shoulder to expose his chest. Before Zagreus could do more than gasp, Ares dove, sucking and biting at any skin he could reach. Even while his mouth worked, Ares raked his nails over Zagreus’s skin. 

Zagreus shuddered, dragging in a trembling breath. Ares’s mouth was hot and wet and working so quickly he seemed to be everywhere all at once. The shivers of pain Ares’s nails clawed into Zagreus’s arm tingled through his whole chest. 

Ares grabbed him by the hair, forcing his head back with a jerk, mouth moving to his throat. Zagreus whined as Ares’s teeth scraped along his neck.

Ares’s mouth came away with a wet smack. He twirled a small knife between his fingers. Where the blade had come from, Zagreus had no idea. Perhaps the God of War could summon weapons at a whim. 

“Your blood is like no other,” Ares said. There was a breathiness to his voice, a roughened edge that spoke to some cold, soul-rending desire. 

He brought the knife to Zagreus’s neck, blade trickling along his skin but not yet piercing it. Zagreus dared not even swallow, holding perfectly still with Ares’s hand in his hair. 

The blade bit, sharp and quick and bright and then gone again. Ares groaned over him, a deep rumble that vibrated through Zagreus’s chest. The lust in that noise sent cold fear through Zagreus – and waves of heat. 

When Ares lowered his mouth back to Zagreus’s neck, he was almost gentle, licking along the cut he’d made, tongue gliding slowly along the trail of blood slipping down Zagreus’s throat. Ares’s breath was hot, puffing out in excited gasps.

The waves of heat won, beating back the fear Zagreus should have felt. Ares’s hand was firm in his hair, his mouth hot as he sucked on Zagreus’s neck. When Ares moaned, the sound pushed down Zagreus’s throat, into his chest, his stomach, his gut. It curled his toes and sent his hips rocking up. 

Ares spoke against his throat. “You are delicious, my kin. This blood of yours, it is a feast worthy of gods.” 

He backed away, however. Zagreus murmured at the loss of Ares’s heat and weight pressed against him, but he did not go far. 

Ares’s hands were rough as he disposed of Zagreus’s remaining clothing, tossing it all aside to leave Zagreus bare before him. Ares eyed Zagreus’s hard cock, a smile coiling along lips rosy with Zagreus’s blood. 

“You see,” Ares said, “you lust for blood the same as I. This shall be an equitable exchange.”

Ares retrieved that little knife, but this time he slashed across his own palm. Blood welled up immediately. The cut must have been ghastly and deep for the amount of blood in Ares’s palm, though he did not seem to mind. He went right for Zagreus’s cock, stroking him with that bloody hand, coating Zagreus in crimson. 

Zagreus groaned. It was horrific. Ares was using his own blood to pump Zagreus. Yet his hand was so firm and sure, his motions so swift and practiced and hard, that Zagreus gasped despite his revulsion and arched into Ares’s hold. Ares thumbed over his head, turning even that a ghoulish crimson, but Zagreus was losing his ability to care. Every smooth motion of Ares’s hand ignited something lurking in Zagreus’s gut. He jerked his hips up to fuck into Ares’s hand, to tease out a little more, a little more, anything he could get. 

“Mmm, yes, that’s it,” Ares rumbled. “You are beginning to understand.”

Zagreus had no idea what he was meant to understand. He knew only the exquisite, gut-clenching heat Ares was pumping into his body. 

Zagreus gasped when Ares’s lips closed around his cock. Ares dipped down, replacing his hand with his mouth, sliding along that blood-slick length. Ares moaned around it, deep voice trembling within Zagreus as he sucked and licked. 

Meanwhile, Ares’s hand slid up, wandering along Zagreus’s torso until Ares had Zagreus’s pec in his bloody hand. He squeezed and groped, clutching at Zagreus’s chest while his mouth dipped down his cock. 

Zagreus wasn’t going to last long this way. Ares’s mouth was as skillful as his hands. His tongue swirled around Zagreus, pressing in ways that made Zagreus buck into Ares’s mouth. All the while, his fingers plucked and teased, tugging on a nipple to shoot a shock of sensation into Zagreus’s chest. 

“L-Lord Ares,” Zagreus choked. 

Ares hummed and Zagreus prayed to all the gods it was a sound of acknowledgment and agreement. There wasn’t a whole lot Zagreus could do if it wasn’t. His body was coiled tight, ready to explode, that single strangled name all the warning he could provide. 

Ares kept his mouth in place as Zagreus arched his hips up, spilling into him. Zagreus’s own mouth was wide, yet no sound emerged from his clogged throat, not until it was nearly over and whimpers and moans could finally wheeze out of him. 

Ares drank it all down, savoring what filled his mouth, then wasted no time crawling up Zagreus’s body. He was still wiping at his lips when he positioned over Zagreus, his hard cock right in Zagreus’s face.

Zagreus felt exhausted, depleted, but he opened his mouth, waiting for Ares. Ares smirked, bending down momentarily to kiss Zagreus. Or, Zagreus had assumed it would be a kiss. In truth, it was far more. Ares used his teeth to clamp down on Zagreus’s bottom lip, biting hard. 

Zagreus tasted iron when Ares withdrew. Both their lips were probably rosy and swollen and stained now. Ares paused a moment, running his thumb over Zagreus’s abused lip, almost tender as he swiped blood onto his finger. He lifted his hand, observing the blood before licking his thumb. 

“More,” he said. 

Then he cut Zagreus again, a quick swipe across his chest, just enough to get prickles of red blood to spring to the surface. Ares swiped up that blood almost reverently before smearing it along his cock. He groaned as he stroked himself, as though the mere touch of that blood aroused him.

“Ah, Zagreus, you taste so sweet. You cannot imagine. It fills me with need unlike any but that found in the glory of battle.”

Zagreus was still catching his breath and could not respond beyond reaching for Ares’s cock and stroking along with him.

“Yes,” Ares said. “Yes, you shall satisfy that need shortly. Very good.” 

He shifted higher, until Zagreus could angle his cock into his mouth. Ares got a hand back into Zagreus’s hair so he could move his head, shifting him around to his liking. Then he pushed in, gliding along that bloody bottom lip, driving his cock and his blood and his need into Zagreus. 

Zagreus tasted the irony tang of Ares himself, but there was more, so much more. Zagreus’s own blood, the sweat of this strange exertion, the tremble of bone-deep desire. He tightened his lips around all of it and moaned, sending his answer right into Ares’s gut. 

Ares groaned, hand going tighter, hips stuttering. He fucked harder into Zagreus’s mouth, nearly choking him with rapid, frantic thrusts. But Zagreus wouldn’t have denied him even if he could. Their mingled blood was a heady potion. Zagreus thought he understood at last what Ares was so very enticed by. Something new sang in Zagreus’s body, beating like war drums, surging through his spent body. He groped for Ares’s powerful thighs, holding them tight so he could take Ares even deeper. 

It should have been wrong. He knew it should have been wrong. His throat already ached. His eyes squeezed shut. Ares threatened to take a chunk of hair out with his strangling grip. 

Yet Zagreus just pulled him closer, taking him deeper, licking along the cock driving into his mouth coated in blood. 

Ares pushed deep, as deep as he could. Zagreus struggled not to gag, calming the reflex with heavy breaths through his nose. Ares held still, thighs trembling around Zagreus as the rest of him went rigid. 

“Yes,” he moaned, deep and low and long. 

And then he spilled into Zagreus’s mouth, choking him with seed until Zagreus swallowed it down just to make space for a breath. 

Ares panted as he pulled out and settled back, released Zagreus’s hair. Zagreus stayed there on the floor, still swallowing down the dregs of Ares’s spend, still trying to catch his breath amid the dizzying experience he’d just endured. 

His lip wasn’t bleeding anymore, but when he swiped his tongue through his mouth, he detected the taste of iron. It made him shiver in a frightening way; surely his body had nothing more to give. He wasn’t even sure if he’d make it through Tartarus anymore. Despite Ares and Athena’s gifts, he was so utterly hollowed out from his encounters with the siblings that he feared to stand, let alone fight. 

Ares sat beside him, dressed and armored again, utterly unflappable. He trailed a finger along the cuts he’d made on Zagreus’s neck and chest. They stung, but they were no longer bleeding. Ares’s finger skimmed lightly over dried, crusted blood. 

“You are delicious,” Ares said. His words blew hot over Zagreus’s sweaty chest, sending a shiver rippling through his body. “Please, tell me how I might reward you.”

Zagreus struggled to gather his thoughts. This was important, desperately important. Athena could protect him, but Ares could strengthen him. Ares could help him annihilate whatever his father put in his way. 

He forced himself up to sitting. 

“I need a weapon,” Zagreus said. “I need to be stronger. I don’t know what my father has planned, but I suspect I’ll have to cut my way through it.”

Ares smiled. “Excellent, my kin. I have every confidence in your eventual success. Let me see.”

He clasped his hands as though in prayer, an odd gesture for the God of War, but when Ares extended one it pulsed with red light. 

“Here,” he said, “take my offering and carve a bloody path to Olympus. I shall enjoy observing your carnage.”

Zagreus didn’t love the sound of that, but he took Ares’s hand regardless. Red light flashed. When it passed, Ares was gone, but heat bit sharp within Zagreus’s chest. Once again, something had changed. When he dressed and retrieved his weapon, he noticed it too pulsed faintly red. Varatha almost hummed when he ran his finger along the blade. In that tremble, Zagreus heard a cry for blood, a lusty, hungry cry. He feared to indulge it, yet some part of him was rejuvenated, excited even.

Zagreus faced the next chamber with renewed strength. Whatever awaited him had to contend with both of his cousins, as well as himself. 

He approached the door. It gave way at a touch.

“See you soon, Meg.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic updates every other Monday!
> 
>  **Next Time:** Zagreus returns to Megaera, but things are very, very different this time.
> 
> \-- 
> 
> I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/purplebookcover) (18+ please).
> 
> I respond to every comment. Thank you, friends!


	5. (Interlude) Megaera and Thanatos

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zagreus faces the consequences of his escape attempts when he runs into both Megaera and Thanatos along his way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is an interlude! No smut. Just plot.

Zagreus stood before Megaera still covered in the blood Ares had smeared over his body. 

“You made it,” she said.

He’d more than made it. After Athena and Ares had finished with him, Zagreus carved through Tartarus like a whirlwind. He was untouchable thanks to Athena’s shields and deadly due to Ares’s blades. Everything he touched shattered, the wretched wrecks of Tartarus’s beasts scattered behind him like a trail of broken glass. 

No, not glass. Glass could at least cut him. The enemies Zagreus slaughtered posed no threat. They were a trail of flower petals, plucked from the stem and withering in his wake. 

Megaera, however, was a bramble. She would not wilt so easily. 

“So, are we doing this?” Zagreus said.

Megaera sighed, unlatching the whip at her hip. “You know it’s my duty to stop you, whatever I might think.”

“Or feel?”

Her face hardened. “I will kill you over and over, as many times as I’m required to.”

“I expect nothing less, Meg. You’re a professional.”

“And you’re an asshole.” Her voice rasped over the words, sand eroding the relentless stone she hid herself behind. 

“I know,” Zagreus said. “I’m sorry.”

“If you were sorry, you’d stop.”

He shook his head. “You know that isn’t true. Come on, let’s get this over with. Though, I should warn you, my cousins visited me.”

Megaera cracked her whip against the stone floor of the chamber. “Begging for aid to defeat me?”

“I need it,” Zagreus said. “I won’t pretend otherwise.”

“Well, at least you have some sense left.”

She charged then, dashing at him so fast he barely dodged out of her path. Her whip cracked, but Athena’s shield protected him from the blow.

Megaera growled in frustration. “Athena. I see.” 

That wasn’t all, but Zagreus would let her discover his other little trick on her own. 

She charged again and he danced back, Athena’s golden shield flashing with each movement, sparing him the worst of her whip. It wasn’t perfect protection and more than once she got through, her lashes biting hot stripes against his arms and calves. She didn’t find anything important though, only limbs and extremities, and Zagreus muttered his thanks to Athena all over again. 

He dashed toward Megaera, confident now in his protection. Varatha slashed out, a gleam of crimson hissing in its wake like red mist curling off the Styx. 

Megaera jerked away, putting several body lengths of space between them, eyes widening. “Ares.”

“I said _cousins_ , not _cousin_ ,” Zagreus said.

“Bastard,” Megaera said. “You made pacts with both of them.”

Pacts. That was one way to think of it. 

She blinked at his silence. Megaera’s eyes narrowed as her gaze honed in on the blood smeared on his chest, Ares’s cut still visible even with his chiton and armor back in place. 

“What did they take from you?” Megaera said.

“Nothing that wasn’t willingly given.” Mostly. 

Megaera’s lip curled. “This is a dangerous path to tread, Zagreus. Even you must realize that. You don’t know what they might ask – or not ask.”

“I’ve survived so far,” Zagreus said. “I might even dare to call it fun.”

“For now. You don’t know who is waiting beyond this chamber and what they’ll want.”

Zagreus shrugged. “I’m plenty powerful as I am now. I can deny them.”

“Elysium is not Tartarus,” Megaera snapped. “You have no idea what you’re doing.”

“Then I suppose I’ll find out.”

He didn’t let her keep chiding him, rushing toward her instead. The attack caught her off guard. Megaera tried to step back, but his spear slashed across her middle. Red infected the wound. Megaera winced with every pulse of crimson light as Ares’s power drained her. 

That wouldn’t be enough, far from it, but it was a damn better start than he usually got against her. She straightened with an effort, whip cracking against the floor before she raced toward him and their weapons and bodies clashed again.

She might have been right about her warning, but as Zagreus battled her back he could not regret his decision. He had her on the run. It was clear as he inflicted more pulsing, evil wounds. Even when her whip wrapped around his neck, he merely grabbed hold of it and let her yank him closer.

Zagreus’s spear preceded him, jabbing through her torso when she pulled too hard, frustrated or angry or both. 

Megaera’s eyes widened. She made a wet choking nose, hands rigid on the whip, but no longer pulling. 

When she could, she drew a shuddering breath and stumbled. Zagreus caught her, let her sag bloody and gasping against him.

“I’m sorry, Megaera,” he said. “I truly am.”

She laughed, pushing against his chest to gaze up at him. Sweat shone on her face as she died in his arms. “You better not fuck this up.”

“I won’t,” he said. “I swear. I’ll do whatever I need to. For you. For Than. I won’t keep doing this to both of you much longer.”

She snorted, hands sliding up to his shoulders. Megaera tottered forward, pressing her mouth against his, almost falling against his lips. 

Zagreus held her, kissing her until her body and mouth went slack and she sighed out a final breath. Then he set her gently on the floor so the Styx could take her and remake her.

#

There was a space between, a space that was neither Tartarus nor Asphodel, a chamber of peace and stillness between the swarming hordes of beasts Hades roused against him. 

Zagreus paused beside the fountain, cupping his hands to scoop up the shimmering, clear water and drink by the handful. He’d never been so thirsty in his entire life. Each gulp revitalized him, sent warmth and life flooding through him. His cuts closed. The burning lashes of Megaera’s whip cooled. Strength surged into exhausted muscles. 

Even with Ares and Athena’s help, Megaera had carved a fair chunk of vitality out of him. Zagreus sat at the edge of the fountain for longer than necessary, letting his body heal as much as it could before he pushed higher. The surface awaited him, but despite his new strength, Zagreus feared he’d still find a way to fail. This was only the first level and he’d stumbled out haggard and bloody. 

“Do you think you’ve won?”

A deep, rumbling voice filled the room, frightening the air around Zagreus so it bunched into thunderclouds. 

“Father.”

“So, you made it through Tartarus,” Hades boomed, disembodied and ever-present. “Do you truly believe that’s good enough?”

“We’ll see, won’t we?”

Hades tsked. “Your cousins can’t protect you from everything. Ares can not fight for you. You will fail even with them on your side, you foolish boy.”

Zagreus sighed, pushing to standing. He raised his arms over his head, stretching before retrieving his spear. 

“You know, Father,” he said as he padded toward the exit, “you could really stand to shut the fuck up.”

The roar of Hades’s outrage echoed hollowly behind Zagreus as he entered Asphodel.

#

Asphodel was hot.

Extremely hot. 

Even with flaming feet, Zagreus had never experienced heat like this. Sweat rolled down his face before he exited the first magma-filled chamber. When he attempted to dip a toe into the river of molten fire surrounding him, he cringed back before he even touched it. His feet may as well have been ice for all the protection they granted him here. 

It was a grim prospect, one he liked even less as he wound through Asphodel. Some of the passages narrowed in on him, pressing close, offering few safe landings among the boiling magma. More than once he dashed or stumbled onto that river of red while trying to dodge an enemy. It cost him every time, wearing down not just his feet but his whole body. 

He started to fear he would not even make it through Asphodel, let alone Elysium beyond. With each chamber, Varatha sagged heavier in his hands. Athena’s shield did not protect him from the magma. Exhaustion weighed down his limbs as enemies forced him to dodge and dance between them without also burning himself. 

Still, Zagreus fought on. He’d die – literally – before confessing to his father or Megaera that perhaps they were right, perhaps even the blessings of his cousins were not enough to see him through this place. 

Zagreus passed under a stone archway into a circular room comprised of small, floating platforms. Each was horribly narrow. As Zagreus appraised them, he wondered if his father had specifically designed this treacherous landscape for him or if it this wretched place had always been this way. 

He did not have time to ponder it. Snarls and and hisses rose like steam all around him. Enemies arrived, shades and beasts summoned by his father to impede his progress. They oozed out of the very stone, materializing on all sides. 

Zagreus gripped his spear. There were too many. Gods, why were there so many? He tightened his hold, but it did not quell the trembling of his weary limbs. Witches and inferno bombers and wringers with golden chains on their disembodied wrists encircled him, already creeping in. 

He could not stop them all. He knew it even before the fight began. 

Hades was gloating in the back of his mind as the first witch gathered up her vile magic. Another to his left summoned purple light into her hands while a wringer crept up from behind. He couldn’t dodge them all, so he resolved to take a few down with him.

Green light flooded the chamber, harsh and startling among all that red. 

Zagreus put up his hands to block the light. When he peered between them, he glimpsed the back of a tall, floating figure dressed in deep gray and wielding a scythe. 

“Than.”

Thanatos did not turn to acknowledge him. He did not flinch or move at all, aside from appraising the shades around them. 

“Just stay alive,” Thanatos said.

Then he launched into action.

Zagreus stood stunned as Thanatos swept toward a witch, cleaving her in half before she could finish casting her spell. He turned on the inferno bombers next. Thanatos’s scythe whirled and purple glowed beneath the enemies’ feet, humming and rumbling until the God of Death released his magic and claimed them in a burst of violence. 

Zagreus shook himself. The wringer was still coming for him, even with Thanatos wrecking havoc throughout the rest of the chamber. Zagreus lurched to the side to dodge that grasping hand, burning himself in the process. He leapt to a different platform, readying Varatha. 

The wringer bolted for him, hand open and clawing at him. Instead of fleeing, Zagreus thrust his spear forward, right through the palm. The wringer shuddered and dissolved into dust. 

The witches were wise enough to be wary of Than, but the inferno bombers jumped from platform to platform, trying to edge around him to reach Zagreus. Zagreus met them head on, charging right for them as bombs exploded on either side of him. The beat of the blasts buffeted Zagreus, but he kept moving, sweeping his spear out to eliminate two of them at once. 

The bombs they dropped as they died finally caught him full on. 

Zagreus threw up his arms too late. The explosion knocked him back. Thankfully, he managed to land on a platform and not in magma, but it was sheer luck he wasn’t burning to death.

Thanatos finally regarded him, concern cracking through the placid mask of his face. He immediately returned to his work, slaughtering shades with renewed fervor. Zagreus could do little but lay back on the stone and watch. Nothing got near him anymore. Nothing even tried. Every beast in the room fixated on Thanatos, that deadly pillar planted in their path. 

When he banished the last shade, Thanatos lowered to the ground. He did not even seem winded, though Zagreus still lay recovering. The God of Death stood tall and unperturbed, his chiton barely ruffled by the ordeal. 

Zagreus had seen him perturbed and undone. It wasn’t even that long ago, though it felt like lifetimes now. He’d seen heat light those gray cheeks. He’d seen the firm line of that mouth part around gasps. He’d seen the neat chiton shoved hastily side to expose the beautiful body beneath. 

That was not how Thanatos faced him now, pacing across the stone and looming over Zagreus. He was harder than the very foundations of this foul place, gray and cold and distant. He banished his scythe with a wave and folded his arms under his chest. 

“You survived,” Thanatos said. “Barely.”

Zagreus forced himself to his feet. He hurt in about a dozen different ways. Blood rolled down the side of his face. His feet ached from the repeated burns. 

“It’s not as bad as it looks,” Zagreus said. “Probably.”

“Well, it looks like you’re on the verge of death.”

“Come to claim me yourself then?” Zagreus said. 

It was a stupid joke, stupid and poorly timed and completely unnecessary, but Zagreus couldn’t help trying to lighten the mood and reclaim what had once been so easy and effortless between them. Megaera was blunt with her resentment and hurt; Thanatos was not. Zagreus could apologize to Megaera, could reason with her, could try to explain all of this, even if she didn’t agree, but with Thanatos it was like trying to climb a sheet of glass, a sheer, blank, insurmountable wall. 

Thanatos huffed and turned, putting his back to Zagreus. Zagreus jerked forward, running after Thanatos, grabbing him by the wrist to slow or stop his departure. Thanatos halted, but the way he glared down at Zagreus’s hand on his arm made Zagreus jerk back like Than’s skin was just as hot as that molten river around them. 

“Wait, Than,” Zagreus said. “Please, can you just wait?” 

“For what? I’ve wasted enough time here.”

“If it was a waste then why did you come here? Why did you help me? You know I wouldn’t have made it through this chamber without you, so what are you doing here if you truly hate me that much?”

Thanatos frowned, mouth twisting. Zagreus held still. He knew sometimes Thanatos just needed time and space, a little pocket in which to sort through his thoughts. He wasn’t quick and sharp like Zagreus and Megaera. He was slow and deliberate and methodical, the solid, stable place Zagreus always retreated to.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Thanatos finally said.

“I’m going to the surface, Than,” Zagreus said. “I’m going to see my mother.”

“Why do you insist on this? You were told it’s a foolish idea, yet you persist all the same. You have no idea what the consequences of your actions might be. Not just for you, for all of us.” 

“No one will tell me,” Zagreus said. “How can I know when all I get are vague warnings? Tell me. Tell me why I should stop. Tell me why I shouldn’t see her.” 

Thanatos shook his head. “I don’t know. It isn’t mine to know.”

“Then why do you want me to stop so badly?”

Thanatos inhaled through his nose, but did not speak.

“I have to do this,” Zagreus said. “Than, please, I know what I’m doing is selfish--”

Thanatos snorted.

“--But it’s worth it, I know it’s worth it.”

“Is it?” 

Perhaps Thanatos meant to glare, meant to make Zagreus cower, but Zagreus had studied this face close enough and long enough to see through it. He’d traced every line and ridge of this face, learning even its subtlest shifts. His fingers ached to reach out now, to smooth the hurt he saw creased between the anger.

“I have to believe it is,” Zagreus said. “Otherwise I hurt you for nothing.”

Thanatos’s eyes narrowed and mouth pinched. He stomped away and this time Zagreus did not attempt to stop him. 

“Than...” 

“Don’t waste this,” Thanatos snapped, his back still to Zagreus. Green light flared. In the next breath, he was gone.

“I won’t,” Zagreus said. 

He continued on alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The smut returns next chapter. Aiming to get it done in a week rather than two.
> 
>  **Next time:** Zagreus is feeling down, but there are two fun-loving gods interested in lifting his spirits.
> 
> \--
> 
> I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/purplebookcover) (18+ please).
> 
> I respond to every comment. Thank you, friends!


	6. Aphrodite and Dionysus

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zagreus falls into the loving embrace of two gods who just want to make him feel good, man. Real good.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CW: Intoxicated sex, so I suppose it's mildly dubious consent.

Zagreus slouched into the next chamber. It lay empty. He should have taken the win and pushed on, but instead he sat upon a crumbled plinth, resting his spear on the ground. 

Megaera and Thanatos’s words still rang in his mind, and his chest. Zagreus hunched, forearms on his thighs, head hanging. 

_If you were sorry, you’d stop._

_Don’t waste this._

He wanted to believe he wouldn’t waste it, that he couldn’t possibly hurt them both that way, but he’d barely delved into Asphodel and already Zagreus sat bleeding onto the stone, feet singed from the river of fire winding through the accursed place. 

It would be worse to turn back. Right? He couldn’t slink home and tell them he’d given up. Somehow that’d be a bigger betrayal than what he was already attempting. 

Zagreus dragged his heavy head up to gaze at the magma bubbling only steps away. He could let Asphodel finish him off. A quick dip in that damn river and he’d be sent straight to the Styx. Even Hypnos’s list wouldn’t give him away. “What? Did you think it couldn’t burn you?” Hypnos would say. And Zagreus could shrug and call himself a moron and drink sullenly in the lounge and beg Meg and Than for forgiveness. Maybe they’d even grant it. 

Even as contemplated that path, it gnawed at him. How long would he have to keep up the lie? Eternity? That wasn’t going to work. He’d break the first time Megaera or Thanatos pressed him about it. 

He sighed. He had to keep going. He _wanted_ to keep going. His mother was waiting somewhere up there. Or perhaps she wasn’t; she’d abandoned him in this place, after all. Either way, he had to find her for himself. He had to know the truth. 

Otherwise, he truly had hurt them for nothing.

Zagreus forced himself to his feet. The chamber was spacious, the river pushed to the far edges of an open slab of stone floor. It was almost a shame he didn’t need to fight his way through it. For the first time since he’d entered Asphodel, Zagreus wasn’t watching where he stepped. 

Red washed through the chamber, softened to purple and pink in places, like those sunsets he’d heard so much about. He hoped they were more beautiful and significantly less likely to burn him on the surface. 

As he paced across the stone, the sunset gradient lightened. He searched, half-believing he might find a surface sun setting somewhere above him, but the ceiling was bleak, impenetrable stone. 

When he lowered his gaze, Zagreus found the source of the glow.

Well, _sources_.

Twin orbs awaited him, one pulsing pink light, the other purple. He paused before them, not reaching for either. He knew these were the summons of gods, but which? And was he meant to choose just one? He doubted the snubbed god would be magnanimous about such a rebuke. 

Beyond that – did he truly want to heed either summon? Athena and Ares had given him power, yes, but they’d also taken something of him with them. He was already bloody and burned and stumbling. Could he take any more? 

Part of him cringed at the mere thought. Yet Megaera and Thanatos kept echoing in his mind. As much as he was wary of another trial, Zagreus knew he would fail without it. 

“Fuck it,” he sighed. “Here we go.”

He closed his eyes and extended his hand, feeling for a god at random. 

“Oh, darling, you’re quite brash.” 

Zagreus yelped and jerked his hand away from a soft swell of flesh. Aphrodite, Goddess of Love, stood before him entirely nude, pink hair cascading over her body. Her mere presence was enough to have Zagreus flushing with heat, mouth open but mute as he blinked at a deity shaped by the very concept of beauty. 

“Hello, little godling,” she said. “My, you’re a handsome one.”

He dared not respond to that. How was one meant to reply to the embodiment of attraction complementing them? 

He was spared any need to speak by a flash of purple light and the appearance of the only being that may well have been Aphrodite’s match for sheer beauty.

“Zag, man, I am _hurt_ ,” Dionysus said. “I mean, I am really injured here.”

“Oh, don’t take it so hard,” Aphrodite said. “The little godling simply has taste.”

Dionysus tsked at her, but smiled at Zagreus, toothy and dazzling. “Heard you were having some trouble down here, man,” he said. “We thought we might be able to help.” 

“Indeed,” Aphrodite said. “We’ve heard quite the tales about you, as well. We thought we might learn about our new companion before you make it to Olympus.” 

“The parties there are something, man,” Dionysus said. “Can’t say it’ll be quite the same here, but we’ll make due with what we’ve got, right?” 

“Sometimes it’s necessary to turn an ugly situation beautiful by brute force,” Aphrodite said.

Zagreus stood stunned before them. Moments ago, he’d been weary and downtrodden, on the verge of throwing himself into molten magma to end himself and trudge home. The mere presence of the pair addressing him had his head swimming, though, light and dizzy. The weariness was gone, washed away by the scent of rose petals and wine suffusing him with every breath. 

Hands gripped Zagreus’s shoulders. He hadn’t even seen the gods move and now one had him on either side. Despite their otherworldly beauty, Zagreus shivered. 

“Would you like our help, darling?” Aphrodite said, her words winding down his throat.

Dionysus set a finger under Zagreus’s chin. “It’s alright. You can tell us.” 

In that moment, he would have told them anything. The dizzying, intoxicating sensation of their auras only got stronger from this close. His body ached, each heartbeat throbbing lower than it ought. 

Aphrodite took him by the chin this time, turning his head toward her. Her lips were flower petals, fragrant and sweet, her face as perfect as a painting, even from this close. Her hair tickled against his skin, silken. 

“You must request it or we cannot grant it,” she said. “Nod yes, little godling.” 

He nodded. 

Aphrodite smiled and Zagreus thought that surely whatever sunset awaited him on the surface could not possibly be so lovely. His entire body responded to her kiss, flushing with heat to rival Asphodel itself. 

“Ah, the exuberance of youth,” Dionysus said. 

Aphrodite pulled away. “Indeed. Why, just look at his lovely rosy cheeks.” She pet his cheek, running a finger over his blushing lips. “We ought to see how he fares with _that_.” 

“An additional boon, eh?”

“For my little godling, all the boons Olympus has to offer.” 

“Not just yours, Aphrodite. Don’t be greedy.”

“I am never greedy with love,” Aphrodite said. 

Dionysus snorted. Zagreus did not pretend to comprehend all that passed between the gods just then. He went willingly to his knees when Aphrodite pushed on his shoulders, but it was not the Goddess of Love who stood over him. Dionysus took her place, stroking his hard cock under his chiton. 

Zagreus needed no instruction or order. He set his hands on Dionysus’s powerful thighs, wandering upward until his hand replaced Dionysus’s. 

From the moment Dionysus’s cock was in his mouth, Zagreus’s head reeled. It wasn’t just the fullness or the way Dionysus grabbed him by the hair and pushed deeper. It was something beyond that, some essence that spread through Zagreus’s body like wine rushing to his head. 

Dionysus held him deep and Zagreus worked his throat, sucking in air through his nose. Each wheezing breath only made him more dizzy and disconnected. He clung to the solidity of Dionysus’s thighs, the only thing keeping him steady. 

“The first of my boons,” Dionysus said, then Zagreus felt it spilling down his throat, warm and heavy, sinking into his stomach, spreading through his whole body. Dionysus held him in place until Zagreus swallowed all of it, but by the time it was gone he had to drag Zagreus up off him. 

Dionysus set Zagreus on the ground. At least, Zagreus assumed it was the ground. It spun and swayed beneath him, even as he lay on his back watching the ceiling curl like waves about to break over him. 

“Oh, Dio, that was far too much.” Aphrodite’s voice floated somewhere outside Zagreus, flower petals dancing on the breeze.

“Give him a minute,” Dionysus said. 

There was a huff or a sigh. Zagreus couldn’t tell and didn’t care, not with Asphodel warping around him. The whole place dripped, like the stone was made of wax and melting from the heat of the river. 

Aphrodite appeared before him, drawing him up to sit, holding his head in her hands. When she peered into his eyes, Zagreus felt like he was falling. He scrabbled for her wrists, afraid he might get lost. 

“Darling, how do you feel?” she said. 

“Wow,” he said. 

Dionysus snorted a laugh. “There you have it,” he said. “He’s got the right spirit, ready to party, right, man?”

Zagreus tried to nod, not because he necessarily agreed, just because it seemed like the correct answer. Aphrodite was still cupping his face; she was so beautiful it made his eyes water just to look at her. She swiped the tears off his cheeks with her thumbs.

“Oh, darling, there’s no reason to cry.”

He watched her lips move, those bright, blushing lips, rosy as dawn on the surface, a promise of worlds above and beyond this wretched place, and Zagreus could not stop himself from leaning forward, seeking out that mouth. She did not stop him, cradling his head as Zagreus found her lips and pressed against them. It was a soft touch, just a brush, but he dared not take more. Even this much made the world suddenly brighter, suddenly crisper. The drunken wavering refracted into a blur of cascading shapes. Zagreus leaned away, watching the ceiling crack and reform, a stained glass portrait made of shifting, jagged shards of color. 

“My, well, now we’ve done it,” Aphrodite said. 

Then something warm encased his fingers, a river, but not one made of flame. One born of the clearest, crispest water ever to spill off the verdant shoulders of Mt. Olympus. He somehow fixed his vision on Aphrodite and saw her taking his fingers into her mouth. She popped them out and held up his hand. 

“Do you know how to use this?” she said. 

He shrugged. She laughed and lay back anyway, drawing him down with her, placing his hand at her pussy. 

Zagreus gasped from touching her, but she held him there and started moving his hand so it rubbed over her. When she let go, he continued the motion, rubbing slick fingers along the silky folds of her cunt. When he found the wetness at her entrance, he could not help but follow it, pushing two fingers inside of her. It was like sinking into a warm bath, the heat washing through his whole body.

Aphrodite writhed and moaned from his curious fingers exploring her, but it wasn’t enough, not nearly enough. Zagreus pulled them free, held them up like some treasure to be adored, and popped them back in his mouth. 

Zagreus moaned around his own fingers. Though he’d never witnessed sunlight himself, Zagreus knew in this moment that if it could be condensed into a taste, it would taste exactly like this: Warm, large, too brilliant to fully comprehend, searing all his senses into incoherence. 

“There is plenty more, darling,” Aphrodite said. She drew his hand out of his mouth and led him down to her.

Zagreus followed, but paused a moment, marveling at what awaited him. The scent of her alone made the light fracture into more splintered, beautiful, deadly shapes. Zagreus’s very body was shattering along with the light, breaking down to its essential pieces. When he finally put his mouth on her, it was not some other body meeting hers; it was trails of light and sound and color curling around each other. 

He therefore did not so much as flinch when Dionysus joined as well.

It was just another body, just another slipstream of light coiling into the flow weaving itself into a tapestry in this place. Dionysus shimmied Zagreus out of his clothes (how preposterous, to still have clothing on) and ran his hands over Zagreus’s ass. He murmured and whispered, his voice a silky rumble that sang in tune with Aphrodite’s lilting moans. 

Zagreus tried to hum in concert, but his mouth was muffled against Aphrodite’s cunt, his tongue busy lapping up every sweet drop of her offering. Somehow, that slickness seemed to extend through his entire body, making him just as wet and pliant when Dionysus’s cock squeezed into his ass. 

This time, Zagreus did manage to moan, his voice filling the space between Dionysus’s and Aphrodite’s, hitting the final note they needed to complete this strange song. When Dionysus swayed, they all swayed, Dionysus plunging deeper into Zagreus, Zagreus hitching closer to Aphrodite, Aphrodite curling her hips up to meet him. 

The gods at either end of Zagreus filled him with their essences, the cacophonous chaos of their bare natures. Sweet and swirling and riotous, it threatened to undo whatever remained of Zagreus himself, whatever was _only_ Zagreus. He could not regard it as a bad thing just then. To merge with others, to give some piece of himself to a larger cosmic family – was this not the very heart and soul of his quest?

It seemed so then, with Dionysus grabbing his hips and pounding into him while he licked into Aphrodite, making her buck and shudder. It wasn’t merely that they were beautiful. Zagreus understood then that love went so much deeper than that, touched some realm beyond physical beauty. 

The piece of him that was still only Zagreus ached at that, reminded of two very different gods, two bodies that perhaps did not shine as brightly as Dionysus and Aphrodite, but echoed with Zagreus’s soul in a way none other could. Dionysus could fill him, could thrust sweetly against his tingling nerves, but his hands were not cool and long-fingered like Thanatos. Aphrodite tasted almost sugary sweet, lacking the tempering shadows, the soothing bitterness of Megaera. 

The thought of his lovers sent new heat through Zagreus’s body. The ache of his longing cut through the intoxication. His whole body seized tight around it. Dionysus’s fingers dug into his hips, his thrusts beating staccato into Zagreus. Aphrodite had him by the hair, pressing him close as she arched up off the floor. 

They spilled in tandem, warmth washing over his mouth and into his ass in nearly the same moment. Zagreus moaned, lapping up Aphrodite’s wetness, clenching around Dionysus’s dick, holding them close until the fragrance of their releases calmed. 

They eased away from Zagreus, but did not leave him on his own. Aphrodite kissed her taste off his mouth. Dionysus helped Zagreus stand, then turned around. 

“Go on, Zag, man,” Dionysus said. “You need to let it out.” 

Only then did Zagreus realize how painfully hard he was. His whole body had clenched around their releases, but had not gotten its own satisfaction. Now, need coiled in his gut like a bowstring pulled so taut it would shatter at the lightest strain. 

Zagreus angled his cock between Dionysus’s waiting thighs, slick with spit or cum or something else entirely. Zagreus did not know and could not hesitate in order to find out. The moment those thick, meaty thighs squeezed around him, he cried out, thrusting between them. He hugged his arms around Dionysus as he rutted helplessly against him, but Dionysus just pressed his thighs in closer, rolling his body to meet Zagreus.

“That’s it, man,” Dionysus said. “You’ve got it, Zag.”

The soft encouragement spurred Zagreus on. He jittered between Dionysus’s thighs, hot with friction as Zagreus chased bliss with abandon. 

It arrived like one of Zeus’s thunderbolts streaking through his body, an electrified hammer blow right to the head. Zagreus cried out, clinging to Dionysus, body seizing and sputtering. It felt like he’d been waiting his entire life to come this one time, but even as it tumbled out of his body in pounding waves, a shred of thought wandered back to those other lovers, those other bodies, different, but no less intoxicating. 

Dionysus and Aphrodite stayed with him as the effects of their natures wore off. They were surprisingly patient, lingering until Zagreus felt nearly entirely clear-headed. 

“Well, darling, this was immensely enjoyable,” Aphrodite said as he sat against her with her hands wandering over his chest. “You’ve certainly a talented tongue, a fact I will be happy to relate to the rest of Olympus.” 

Dionysus laughed. He sat before Zagreus, lounging, those thighs mostly bare with his chiton skewed out of place. “Not bad at all, man. I gotta tell ya, it can get down right stuffy up there but you are going to bring some life to that party, I’m sure of it, man.”

“Speaking of which,” Aphrodite said, “how might we aid you in joining us for real, little godling? As fun as this was, I want the authentic thing some day.” 

Right. Boons. Gods, Zagreus could not even fathom boons and fighting right now, but they were right. If he was going to get out of here, he’d need their help. The first half of Asphodel had proven that. 

“Listen, man,” Dionysus said, “you’re looking a little rough, if I’m being honest. Let’s help you out with that. I’ve heard there are some fountains down here. I’ll make sure they’re full of the good stuff.” He winked. “Here’s a little sample, though. You seem like you need it.” 

Zagreus took the drink Dionysus offered. It seemed like plain water, but when Zagreus sipped it strength flooded his body. It was something like the pool he’d found between Tartarus and Asphodel, but this was a far more potent potion, one that sent power surging into his muscles and didn’t merely repair his wounds. 

“There you go, man,” Dionysus said. “Looking better already.”

“You cannot merely heal,” Aphrodite said. “You must fight back. But I see you’ve been in contact with Ares. Perhaps together he and I can ensure you are far stronger than your foes.” 

She pressed her hand against his chest, right over his heart. Zagreus felt a jolt like a spark of lightning, but it did not hurt. 

“There,” she said. “You will weaken your opponents with your very presence. That ought to make them reconsider hindering you, my darling.” 

He still wasn’t sure exactly what Aphrodite meant when she and Dionysus rose.

“Our time here is over,” Aphrodite said, “but do come see us when you reach Olympus, yes? We’ve plenty more tricks to show you.”

She winked, Dionysus chuckled, and both vanished in a shower of ruddy sunset.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I *might* be back in one week instead of two. We'll see. I'm trying to do faster chapters when I can.
> 
>  **Next time:** Zagreus fights Lernie.
> 
> \--
> 
> I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/purplebookcover) (18+ please).
> 
> I respond to every comment. Thank you, friends!


	7. Lernie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lernie is lonely. 
> 
> He makes a friend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **CW:** I actually had to add a non-con warning to the whole fic for this chapter. It's not that bad. Keep reading if you want to make sure before proceeding. Skip if you don't want spoilers for the chapter.
> 
> -
> 
> -
> 
> -
> 
> Lernie uses a spit/venom kinda thing that sort of mind breaks Zagreus so he doesn't want to leave. Zagreus isn't particularly damaged or distraught when the venom wears off.

For the rest of his time in Asphodel, Zagreus didn’t so much as burn his feet. He had four gods working with him now, making him stronger and his enemies weaker. They propelled him through Asphodel and right into the chambers of its guardian. 

The bone hydra rustled in its nest. Bones rattled – its own and the scattered detritus of other, unfortunate creatures. It raised its massive head of bleached white bone and blinked glowing golden eyes. As it reared up, pink spines rustled at the sides of its face like a surface cat’s whiskers twitching. Even the crest at the front of its face reminded Zagreus of the cats he’d seen on scrolls and in books and in the backgrounds of paintings, two spiny pink ears perking up to perceive this tiny intruder. 

“Well, hello there, Lernie,” Zagreus said. “I’ve heard so much about you.”

The hydra’s head tilted sideways as though it was curious. 

“Look, I need to get past you,” Zagreus said, “so if you don’t mind just scooting aside.”

The head raised up on a massive neck of colossal vertebrae. Then it opened its mouth, revealing rows and rows of razor sharp teeth fringing a fathomless black maw, and hissed.

“Guess not,” Zagreus said a moment before the bone hydra struck.

He rolled out of the way as that chasm of endless night snapped shut around the air where he’d been standing. Zagreus feared to imagine what might happen if he was caught in that thing. Death would be the best possible outcome, a swift trip to the Styx and Hypnos, but there was something eternal about the inside of the hydra’s mouth and that promised a much more agonizing future than mere death. 

Zagreus dashed, staying light on his feet, never lingering in one spot very long. The hydra snapped and hissed, always a step behind. Neither of them were gaining any ground, just dancing around each other in a semi-circle. 

The hydra stopped, rattling in place like a bubble of magma about to explode. It made some low cooing noise. The Phlegethon boiled and bubbled. Several more heads burst from the river, similar to Lernie if less decorated in spines and quills. 

“That’s bad,” Zagreus mumbled. 

He dashed. He sprinted. He leapt and rolled. But no matter where he went it just put him in proximity to some other head. They herded him into a smaller and smaller net, closing in around him until Zagreus had no option but to try to cut his way free. One head went down in a spray of bone, shattered by his spear and the bite of Ares’s wrath. 

It wasn’t enough. If the other heads cared for their fallen fellow, they made no show of it. They struck before their comrade had even disintegrated into fine gray powder. Zagreus struggled as teeth clamped around one arm, then the other, two hydras lifting him off his feet and into the air. 

They weren’t chomping down, though, not as much as they could. Zagreus’s arms were still attached to his body. They weren’t destroying him; they were merely holding him in place. 

He might have felt relieved by the reprieve, but then Lernie raised up before him, slow and sinuous as a snake about to strike. That window into the cosmos opened. No matter how Zagreus looked, there was only darkness, deep, cold, endless darkness, like the realm of chaos that spawned the rest of reality. Zagreus stared into that yawning abyss and everything in him froze.

Lernie regarded him. If it had nostrils, Zagreus would have believed it was sniffing him. Glowing golden eyes glimmered like sharpened knives preparing to butcher some poor beast. Then the bone hydra opened its mouth and Zagreus cringed, bracing against some hideous eternity of nothingness. 

Something struck him in the face.

It wasn’t teeth. It wasn’t a fathomless void, either. It was incredibly fathomable, mostly because it was wet and horrible and oozed down Zagreus’s face with a revolting, tactile squelch.

Zagreus spluttered and blinked. Lernie merely watched him while two of its other heads gently kept him aloft. Very gently. Their mouths were warm, Zagreus noticed, and the teeth did not bite so much as tickle. 

He giggled. It was a ridiculous noise, given the circumstances, but at the sound the mouths dropped him. 

Zagreus hit the stone and sat there. Lernie lowered, head resting on the stone like a cat waiting to be pet. 

And Zagreus desperately wanted to pet it.

He stood, found his legs wobbly beneath him and stumbled forward. He had to catch himself against the giant skull, oddly soft beneath his hands. Lernie’s quills bristled and Zagreus squealed with excitement. He’d always wanted to meet those creatures on the surface and here was a close approximation of one, rumbling with purrs just like he’d read they would. 

Zagreus laid against the hydra’s head, stroking it, feeling it thrum beneath him. That sticky glob of spit still clung to his skin, but Zagreus nearly enjoyed it. It certainly didn’t disgust him. It was like a kiss. Zagreus returned the gesture, kissing the top of the hydra skull. Lernie cooed in response. 

“All this time,” Zagreus said, “you just wanted pets.” 

Lernie gurgled. Zagreus slid off the skull, stepping back to gaze at the whole of the hydra’s head. Lernie nuzzled at him with the protrusion at the front of its skull, the not-nose that still somehow seemed to snuffle at Zagreus. 

Then it spit on him a second time. 

This glob was less revolting, but perhaps more surprising. Zagreus laughed as he wiped it away with trembling hands. His legs turned to liquid. He fell back on the stone, surprised to suddenly be sitting. 

Lernie nudged in, that not-nose sniffing at Zagreus. The hydra wasn’t an animal so much as … a being. There was too much intelligence in those golden eyes, too much deliberateness to the way the hydra carefully picked at Zagreus’s chiton with its teeth. Zagreus realized that he wasn’t dealing with something even remotely close to a surface cat. This was still a beast of the underworld; it merely played at being cat-like. For Zagreus’s amusement? He wasn’t sure, but it endeared Lernie to Zagreus either way. 

Zagreus surrendered, lying back, goopy and only half-dressed anymore. Something kept rubbing, rubbing, rubbing at Zagreus, something too small and fine to be the hydra’s head. This was delicate and deliberate, like enormous fingers picking curiously at Zagreus. 

The spines, he realized. Those pink spines. They were … elongating somehow, spreading out like a sentient web. They weren’t trapping him, however. It was more like... 

Exploring.

One slithered its way up Zagreus’s body, soft and flexible now. It was covered in the goop, the oddly enticing spittle flung twice into Zagreus’s face. The rest of Lernie’s head loomed huge over Zagreus as that single spine made its lonesome way to his mouth, rubbing along his lips like a lover parting them for a kiss. 

It did not dive into his mouth, however. It started at his nose. 

It was like plunging under water. When the Styx took him, when he woke up in a new body submerged in water, he often sucked in an accidental breath, dragging water into his sinuses. This felt the same, a rush of pressure that did not belong. 

It receded just as quickly, but now the goop was inside him too. He barely even noticed when the spine pushed past his lips and and infiltrated his throat. Unlike the delirious bliss of Dionysus and Aphrodite, this was a … a type of fading away. It was an underworld river washing in, then taking some piece of him with it as it washed back out. It was the slow decay of the universe. He was turning gray, the very saturation of his skin leaching out. 

Zagreus managed a small yelp of surprise when the spine inserted itself in his ass, but it was only a twinge. Everything down here wanted to fuck him – everything above as well. This wasn’t even that much weirder than the rest.

In fact, as that sloppy spine pumped in and out, Zagreus distantly heard himself moaning with delight. His body was a detached, impartial observer of this particular experience, like his mind was floating above himself to watch his body get pounded into the stone. 

Lernie squeezed in a second spine. They coiled around each other, forming a sort of spiral cone that dragged strange and wonderful inside Zagreus. He arched away from and into the intertwining spines wriggling inside him. Any last lingering tethers to his senses fled; he was abandoned outside his body, a senseless, floating mass of tingling nerves and bubbling heat. 

Zagreus did not see Lernie lower its great bony, spiny head. But he felt something close around him, not warm and wet, but boundless and horrifying. He might have screamed. It was difficult to tell if that rasp in his throat was his voice or just another spine making use of a hole. Either way, the fear subsided, trembling into something else, something like … rapture. 

He could not imagine wanting to be anywhere other than here. He was falling, dying, splitting in half, yet it was the most exquisite death he’d ever experienced. A darkness beyond comprehension enveloped him. He languished for eternity. And still somewhere his body rocked against the stone, impaled on spines determined to witness his pleasure. 

He thought he came, but it vanished into a nothingness beyond his reckoning.

#

That was how his uncles found him. Goopy. Fucked. And still being fucked. Tucked away in the hydra’s den like a prized pile of bones among all its other piles of bones.

Zagreus could not remember how long it had been since he’d entered the hydra’s chamber. He could not even remember _why_ he’d entered this lair. At this point, the only reason he could come up with was love. 

Surely, he must have arrived here out of pure love for Lernie, a desire to stay nestled safely with it for the rest of eternity, a longing to have its spines in every hole whenever and however it liked. 

When his uncles arrived, an interminable distance of time had passed. Zagreus was jolting atop a pile of bone, a spine in his ass, another in his throat, whining with pleasure as the hydra tried to find some new crevice to burrow into. 

Light flared in the chamber, golden and blue, a crackling tidal wave of light that made Lernie reel back and withdraw its spines with a hiss. Zagreus was left sopping and bereft. 

“Well, this would explain why he’s been so still,” a deep voice rumbled.

Zagreus turned his head, searching for the source of the voice. It was difficult to fathom those pulsing columns of light, let alone to perceive them. They cooled, shifting into more comprehensible forms. Zagreus had never encountered his uncles before this moment, but he knew Zeus and Poseidon the moment they materialized. 

“My, quite the pickle, this one,” Poseidon said. “You’ve certainly a taste for adventure, Little Hades.” 

“He has the soul of a true Olympian,” Zeus added. The note of pride in his voice sounded strange, even to Zagreus’s blissed out, gooped up ears. 

Lernie hissed. The river boiled. Poseidon and Zeus did not even deign to glance at the many extra heads rearing up out of the waters of Asphodel, no more threatened than they’d be if Lernie had summoned Dusa for help. 

Neither Poseidon nor Zeus moved, not in any way Zagreus could detect, but the hydra’s heads exploded one after the other, bone shattering with a pop like air disappearing into a black hole. Chips of white pattered to the ground and Zagreus wondered if this was anything like snow. 

Only Lernie remained, but up against two gods, its hisses bore little threat. Poseidon shaped a ball of water in his hands. It slowly grew until it was the size of Zagreus’s shield back home. As he sent it streaking toward Lernie, Zeus infused it with crackling lightning. 

Lernie hissed in outrage, but that simply allowed the magic passage down its throat. What Zagreus had taken as a fathomless pit was now apparently full of water and lightning, each element feeding off the other to create a storm that shredded the hydra from the inside out. Lernie rumbled and shuddered, golden eyes going wide. 

Then it exploded and bone rained down in punishing, sharp little shards. 

Zagreus covered his head, still naked and wet atop the pile of bone where he’d lived for who knew how long. He gaped at the place where Lernie had been. Some deep ache opened in his chest. He looked to his uncles not with thanks but rather with raw, unfiltered fear. 

He scrambled back on the bone as they approached, but there was nowhere he could go. Zeus remained towering over him, but Poseidon crouched down, stroking his long watery beard as he contemplated Zagreus. 

“Didn’t know that one worked on gods,” Poseidon said. “You’ve been through quite the ordeal, Little Hades.” 

“The creatures down here are truly sickening,” Zeus grumbled. “My brother would come up with something as foul as a bone hydra. A bone hydra with _needs_.”

“Ha!” Poseidon said. “Well, it may not be Hades’s fault. The underworld is not entirely his doing. He is merely its steward.” 

“If _I_ were steward of this wretched place it would not contain horny bone hydras.”

“Precisely why your duties lie elsewhere, brother.” Poseidon focused his attention on Zagreus, who flinched away from eyes brimming with entire oceans. “My, well, we must undo this at once, mustn’t we?” He reached out and pressed a single fingertip to Zagreus’s forehead. 

Zagreus gasped. Water rushed through him, cool, fresh water. It was a little like the Lethe, except a thousand times more pure, a million times more refreshing and clean and quenching. Zagreus’s entire body felt wrung out, washed from the inside out. 

He didn’t realize he was crying until Poseidon wiped away the tears. “There, there, Little Hades,” he said. “Better it come out this way than choose some other route.” He laughed as though this were funny and not horrifying. “How are you feeling?”

The moment Poseidon asked, Zagreus thudded into his body. It felt like he’d been away from it for days, weeks, _lifetimes_. He could not recall the last time he’d been _inside_ himself, as strange as that sounded. Everything was sore, perhaps from apparently living and sleeping on bone, perhaps from Lernie’s attentions. 

He stood with help from Poseidon and tested his limbs. “I think I’m all right,” Zagreus said. “But what in the world happened?” 

“Old Lernie got lonely, it seems,” Poseidon said. “You must have looked a tasty companion with all those gods attached to your heels at the moment.” 

“That is … perhaps the most horrible thing I’ve ever heard,” Zagreus said. 

Poseidon laughed, loud and booming in this wretched place. Zeus twisted his lips as though tasting the foulness of the very notion. 

“Uh, thank you, for, you know, sorting that out,” Zagreus said. 

“Our pleasure, Little Hades,” Poseidon said.

“But how did you know?” Zagreus said. “And why did you come here?”

“We are all watching your progress eagerly, young man,” Zeus said. “Quite a few of us upon Olympus are personally invested in your success, as you have seen.”

Zagreus remembered the many boons offered to him. Gods, was the entire mountain watching him get fucked down here during his slow, plodding trip to the surface? Not that they weren’t responsible for the fucking half the time, but even so... 

A sudden thought chilled Zagreus to the bottoms of his flaming feet. “Dear uncles, I am flattered by your help, but I … right now I could not possibly...”

Poseidon’s laugh shook the bleak stone walls of Lernie’s nest. “Oh, Little Hades, that is very kind but our help does not come with a price.”

Zagreus sagged with relief, his weary, used body nearly sinking to the floor. 

“Besides,” Poseidon said, “we are not offering boons. We merely interceded where we saw fit. We do that from time to time, you know. The capricious whims of the gods and all that. You should read the mortal treatises on the subject.”

“I certainly hope to,” Zagreus said, “some day.” 

“That’s the spirit,” Poseidon said. “Now, if I might make a suggestion, pause a moment for some fishing. You may find it meditative.” 

“Are the fish...”

“Oh, they are quite ordinary underworld fish,” Poseidon said. “I merely maintain that everyone should fish. It is the most noble of past times. Refreshes the mind, body and spirit.” 

Zeus rolled his eyes. “He doesn’t require a screed on the value of fishing, Poseidon. Come, we’ve done what we came here to do. Let’s leave this foul place.” 

“Ah, very well,” Poseidon said. “Good luck, Little Hades!”

Zagreus covered his eyes in anticipation of the flares of light that erupted to announce the gods’s departure. He was tempted to collapse to the floor and sleep for a thousand years once they were gone, but the idea of Lernie returning sent Zagreus sprinting from the chamber and, at last, from Asphodel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/purplebookcover) (18+ please).
> 
> I respond to every comment. Thank you, friends!


	8. Patroclus/Achilles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zagreus is on his way again, but boy, he could use a break. He sits down to rest in a grassy, peaceful field in Elysium. Then he hears laughter and moans nearby...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I thought Zagreus (and you) could use a break after that Lernie business, so here is a far fluffier chapter where Zag's mentors take care of him. No CWs this time!
> 
> Also, this deviates pretty hard from the timeline of the canon story, but I couldn't include Patroclus and Achilles without speed running that side quest. So just ... roll with it.
> 
> Lastly, thank you to Twitter for voting for this chapter! This was the fill-in chapter that won the poll.

Zagreus approached Elysium with more caution than excitement. The verdant hillsides, the marble columns, the crystalline waters of the Lethe: They did not convey safety so much as warning. Everything here was false – too bright, too clean, too lush and growing. Even Zagreus could see the hollowness behind this imitation of the surface. 

Perhaps it was merely meant to comfort the heroes spending eternity here, to offer them a taste of the life they’d once had. Judging from the way they threw themselves at Zagreus, they took little consolation from the farce. 

He cut them down without mercy. He had no idea how long Lernie kept him in its lair; he didn’t have time to wander around. 

Zagreus chose the most efficient route he could, even when it took him through rooms guarded by massive butterfly balls and passages clogged with brightswords. Athena repelled their pathetic swipes. Ares burned them down to dust; Aphrodite weakened the blows that did manage to scratch at Zagreus, leaving him basically unharmed when he found a chamber free of enemies.

The Lethe wound through the chamber, cutting through a field of blue-green grass that glowed with ethereal light. It would have been beautiful if it did not suffuse absolutely every area of Elysium, making Zagreus’s eyes water with its brightness. 

A lacy white bridge skipped over the Lethe. Zagreus followed it to the other side, where he found a little courtyard filled with old pottery. A second bridge arched over the river a little farther ahead and up a hill, but Zagreus paused in the courtyard to rummage through the debris. Sometimes these pots hid a few coins left behind by a shade or hero. Those would serve him well if he happened to run into Charon down here. At least the boatman took no sides in this – coin was coin. If Zagreus could pay, Charon would help.

He was shaking a pot, listening for the clink of coins inside, when voices rasped through the room. Zagreus froze, but this was not the guttural grunts of the heroes of Elysium nor the discordant screeches of witches and wretches. This was … laughter. 

He listened, doubting his own ears, but tinkling laughter whispered through the chamber again, barely louder than the gurgling of the spectral river. It was an easy laugh, a carefree, genuine note of mirth. It did not belong at all in this place. 

Zagreus moved slowly, his curiosity insatiable. As he approached the second bridge arching over the Lethe, voices murmured between the laughter, low and light and playful. He crouched behind a post of the bridge, peering along its gentle curve to the grassy field beyond. And there lying tangled around each other were Achilles and Patroclus. 

Zagreus flushed. His teacher’s joy at being reunited with his love was no secret to Zagreus, but he’d never really seen it in action, not like this. To him, Achilles was always stern and reserved, if kind and caring at the same time. Even when Achilles had spoken of Patroclus, of his desire to see his lover once again, it had been restrained, brief, clipped. He offered the shortest answers possible, devoid of detail or embellishment.

But not here. Here, Achilles lay on his side, legs slotted between Patroclus’s, stroking through Patroclus’s beard and smiling at him like all the universe’s goodness emanated from one man’s face. 

“I told him it was a useless endeavor,” Patroclus said. His hand ran idly up and down Achilles’s side. “But he would not be deterred.”

“Oh no,” Achilles said. “Were you at least kind to him, when it came down to it?”

“As kind as I could be,” Patroclus said. “I fear he found it an awful disappointment when he learned my heart belonged to another.” 

Achilles’s smile grew. He leaned forward, kissing Patroclus softly, thumb caressing his cheek. “And does it still?” 

“You know well it does,” Patroclus said. 

They leaned back in, pressing their lips and bodies closer together, hands wandering over cheeks and necks and shoulders. Zagreus sank back, flushing. Somehow, this was more difficult to witness than any of the debauchery he’d been part of thus far. This wasn’t mere sex. This was … _intimate_. 

He leaned against the post, hardly daring to breathe as laughter bubbled up on the other side of the bridge. The mirth dissolved to breathy sighs and heat shot up Zagreus’s neck. Oh gods, he was too late. Or perhaps too early. He’d come here at exactly the wrong moment and now he was trapped. He couldn’t spring up and reveal that he’d snuck up to investigate. Nor could he pretend he’d only just arrived. They surely wouldn’t be fooled by that. He had to sit still as a stone against that pillar and merely endure as clothing shuffled and someone moaned. 

“Achilles,” Patroclus gasped, “you remember that spot, even after all this time?” 

“Mmm.” 

It wasn’t an answer. It wasn’t an answer at all. It was just another moan among moans. 

There was some horrifyingly wet noise and Patroclus groaned. “Yes, love, exactly like that. Ah, your tongue is just as skillful as I recall.” 

Zagreus’s eyes went wide. He slapped his hands over his mouth, but he shook from trying to hold so still and quiet through this. Worst of all, he was hard. Gods help him. Perhaps he was just so primed from all of his adventures through the underworld thus far, but merely imagining what Achilles was doing with his mouth to elicit those noises from Patroclus had Zagreus’s cock straining for attention. 

He wished he could stuff his cock down, wished he could make it relax, but as Patroclus’s voice rose in both volume and pitch it only pushed more eagerly against his chiton. Zagreus’s dick pulsed with each heartbeat, a drum pounding out the seconds until his embarrassing and horrible end. 

Still, he could not resist. Zagreus peered around the bridge. He could just barely see Patroclus’s thighs around Achilles’s head, Achilles’s face buried between them. 

Zagreus squirmed a hand under his chiton and into his leggings. Every sound now had an associated image and gods, those images were good. Achilles moaned as he licked at Patroclus. Patroclus arched up off the grass. Abruptly, Achilles rose up, flipping Patroclus onto his stomach. Then he dove right back in. Patroclus yelped from the shift and Achilles slapped his ass in response, a sharp crack.

Zagreus pumped his cock. He’d never seen his teacher so animated, not outside sparring. Achilles was going after Patroclus’s ass like he went after a wretch with his spear. Judging from the noises bounding through the searing brightness of Elysium, Patroclus was faring little better than Achilles’s other opponents. 

Achilles’s mouth came away with a wet pop. Then he turned--

And looked directly at Zagreus.

Zagreus froze, his dick hard in his hand and obvious outside his chiton. Achilles met his eyes dead on, turning Zagreus’s blood to ice. He hadn’t realized he’d crawled a little closer on the bridge, close enough to leave himself entirely exposed. 

“S-sir,” he said. 

Patroclus startled, sitting up in the grass. He was naked aside from the rucked up fabric falling over his chest. He tried to cover his hard cock, but Achilles made no similar effort, sitting there nude and unflinching as he looked right at Zagreus.

“Come here, lad,” Achilles said. It was the same voice Achilles always used, the same soft tone he’d speak to Zagreus with any other time. But this was not any other time.

“S-sir, I’m so sorry,” Zagreus said. “I was just--”

“I did not ask for an explanation,” Achilles said. “I asked you to come here. Come along, now.” 

Zagreus stuffed his hard cock back into his leggings, rising onto watery legs to make his way across the bridge. He knelt in the grass, trying not to look down at the nudity of the two men before him. 

“You have interesting timing, lad,” Achilles said. 

“Achilles, is this...” Patroclus said.

“Yes, the boy I told you about,” Achilles said. “The son of Hades.” 

“I-I’m so sorry, sirs,” Zagreus said. “I was just trying to make my way to the surface and this room seemed a quiet respite. I’ve done so much fighting to get here and I just thought I might be able to r--”

“Shh, lad,” Achilles said. He placed a finger over Zagreus’s lips. “You need not apologize.” 

Achilles glanced at Patroclus. Somehow, when their eyes met, an entire conversation unfolded in silence. Zagreus had no idea what they were deliberating, only that with a look they were indeed coming to some simultaneous conclusion. 

Then Patroclus kissed him. 

It was soft, gentle, hardly more than a stirring of the air, but Zagreus tasted the heat nonetheless. Patroclus cupped his face, beard scratchy as he pressed in a little closer, a little harder. 

Zagreus relaxed into it. It was so … so nice. So soft. After all he’d been through – being captured by Lernie, being drugged by Dionysus and Aphrodite, being bled half to death by Ares, being caged by Athena – this kind brush of lips was just … nice. Tense muscles relaxed all down Zagreus’s back. He would have sighed if Patroclus’s mouth was not against his. 

He nearly forgot about Achilles until a hand wriggled under his chiton and into his leggings to grip his cock. Achilles did not stroke particularly hard or fast, but it dragged out a moan all the same. Their dual attention, while gentle, left Zagreus limp as a doll between Achilles and Patroclus. 

Patroclus drew back, still cupping Zagreus’s face. “Would you like to rest with us for a bit, stranger?” he said. 

Achilles’s hand paused on his cock. Zagreus wished it hadn’t.

“Yes,” he said. “Yes, I think I’d like that very much.”

Patroclus smiled wryly. “You’ve been through quite a lot, I hear.” 

“Yes, sir.” 

“You’ve done well to come this far,” Achilles said. “You’ve worked hard, put all that training to use. Let us take care of you for a bit.” 

“P-please, sir,” Zagreus said. 

Achilles laughed, but it was not unkind. “Aye, lad. We’ve got you.”

Zagreus’s body apparently took that as permission to surrender entirely. He melted in Achilles and Patroclus’s hands, letting them undress him, letting them skim their fingers over his flushed skin, letting them explore gently. 

They shared space on his cock, sucking and licking along Zagreus. All Zagreus could do was lay back and accept the clashing sensations. Sometimes it was all tongues. Sometimes one of them would suck on the tip or fit their tongue into a crook that made Zagreus shudder with delight. Once, one of them trailed lower, sucking Zagreus’s sac into their mouth. 

Zagreus moaned at the lightning sizzle that crackled over the delicate, thin skin there and shot right up into his gut. Whoever made the discovery kept after it, while the other fit his cock into their mouth. 

Zagreus squirmed until a hand pinned his hip down. The sensation building within him scrabbled for release, like a shaken up bottle of ambrosia straining against the cork. Every lick and suck shook him more, sent more pressure bubbling through him. 

It was almost a relief when they relented. Zagreus lay on the ground panting, shivering even without Achilles and Patroclus touching him anymore. 

“My love,” Patroclus said, “I am happy to spoil your student, but that is not why we met here today.”

“I know,” Achilles said. “Perhaps if we tried like this...”

The voices floated outside Zagreus, distant and detached. He did not fully appreciate their meaning until someone pulled him up to sit. Zagreus blinked out of his blissful haze. Achilles smiled at him, brushing back Zagreus’s mussed hair. 

“Hang on, lad,” he said.

He hugged Zagreus against his chest, fitting his hand between them to grip both of them at once. Zagreus sucked in a sharp breath, hands clutching at Achilles’s back even before Patroclus slid up behind him. 

Patroclus pressed up against Zagreus’s back, his cock rubbing on Zagreus’s ass. He and Achilles squeezed Zagreus between them, reaching for each other as though Zagreus wasn’t even there. They grabbed each other by the hair, kissing over Zagreus’s shoulder, murmuring into each other’s mouths. 

All Zagreus could do was cling to Achilles, who still had their cocks in hand. Patroclus was grinding against Zagreus, slotting between his cheeks. The friction pressed in from both sides, as though Zagreus was just a doll caught between Achilles and Patroclus’s bodies. 

Their lips never separated, a fact Zagreus heard more than saw. Every moan, every hot breath, every wet swipe of a tongue played right beside Zagreus’s ear. He could tell just from the sound how their excitement grew. Patroclus yanked Zagreus’s hips against him and rut against his body while Achilles pumped their cocks in the tight, narrow space between them. 

It all took on a rhythm, a flow. Zagreus was a tiny boat caught in a storm, rocked by the waves on either side of him, buffeted by the motions of others’ pleasure. He dug his nails into Achilles’s back, the last safe, stable harbor that remained to him, and squeezed his eyes tight against the jolting and throbbing. 

Achilles swiped a thumb over the tip of their cocks, dragging pre-cum back down with him. His own? Zagreus’s? It was impossible to tell and at this point Zagreus didn’t even care what the answer was. Every stroke of that strong, calloused hand, a hand that had guided Zagreus through so much already, threatened to unravel him, to leave him wrecked by the flurry batting him back and forth between the bodies pressed in so close. 

Achilles and Patroclus separated their mouths with a wet pop, each gasping. Patroclus’s fingers dug into Zag’s hips as he searched for more friction against Zagreus’s ass and back. Achilles gripped almost too tight as he attempted to eek more speed and pressure out of the small space afforded him for the task. 

“Achilles,” Patroclus gasped. 

“I know, love,” Achilles said. “I am nearly there as well.” 

“May I?” Patroclus said. “With him? Like this?” 

“Yes, I think you may,” Achilles said. “Lad?”

It took Zagreus a moment to realize Achilles was actually speaking to him, that he was human and not some toy tossed between the waves. Yet he could not summon words. He merely held Achilles tighter and groaned, shifting his hips first toward Achilles and then back against Patroclus. 

Achilles’s laugh was breathy, but it conveyed what it needed to. Patroclus released with a grunt, spilling against Zagreus’s back. His grip tightened at the peak, almost enough to hurt, then his hands and body eased. He still held Zagreus by the hips, but now it seemed in service of assisting Achilles.

Achilles used the extra space they gained when Patroclus shifted back. He pumped harder, faster, stroking up and down both of them the moment he could, going the full span of their lengths now that he was free. 

Zagreus arched back. Patroclus was there to catch him, his hands against Zag’s shoulders to support him as he curled into the pleasure. Patroclus laughed, a short chuckle close to Zagreus’s ear, but it was not mocking, merely amused. 

“Come along now, lad,” Achilles said in the very same tone he’d used for so much of Zagreus’s weapons training. 

Zagreus had learned long ago to obey that voice, that soft suggestion of command. He came in and on and over Achilles’s hand, came as Achilles went on stroking it out of him one fitful beat at a time until there was nothing left but Zagreus shuddering and spent. 

Patroclus still had him by the shoulders. He let Zagreus lean back against him and catch his breath. 

“He’s a good student,” Patroclus said. “I can see why you chose him.”

“Aye, he is,” Achilles said. 

Shuffling and shifting. Zagreus still sat against Patroclus, but Achilles was moving around. Zagreus realized why when Achilles wiped the spend off his back and passed the rag to Patroclus. 

Zagreus sat up on his own as the others cleaned up. He sighed out a breath. After all the strangeness and tension, all the bizarre adventures he’d been on, it was so nice to find himself in the care of two such as Achilles and Patroclus. They did not treat him like a child, but they still cared for him in their own way. 

They even let him lay in the grass with them afterward, catching his breath and regaining his strength for the push ahead. 

“You’ve come a long way, lad,” Achilles said. 

“There’s still a ways to go,” Zagreus said. 

“Aye, but I think you’ll conquer it,” Achilles said. 

Zagreus rolled onto his side to smile at Achilles, who had an arm around Patroclus, resting on his chest, drowsy and even quieter than usual. 

“Thank you, sir,” Zagreus said. “That truly does mean a lot.”

“It is merely the truth,” Achilles said. “You’ve accomplished a feat no one thought was possible, myself included. I’m proud of you, lad.” 

Zagreus swallowed, nearly more overcome than he had been during the sex. “I won’t let you down.”

Achilles and Patroclus both laughed. “Oh, lad, you already haven’t.” 

“You’ve no idea how much I’ve had to hear about you, stranger,” Patroclus added. “He won’t stop praising his best student.” 

Zagreus scratched at the back of his head. “That’s, sir, that’s really. I’m so. You don’t need to--”

“Zagreus,” Patroclus cut in. It was the first time Zagreus had heard him call him anything but “stranger.” “Take the praise. He does not dole it out lightly or frivolously. If Achilles says it, he means it.” 

Zagreus nodded. 

“Where to next, lad?” Achilles said after a moment. 

Zagreus shrugged. “Wherever these chambers lead me, wherever I have to go to reach the surface.” 

“You are not far off,” Achilles said. “Keep pushing, but be wary of the champions of Elysium. They shall not make your path an easy one.”

“The champions of Elysium?” 

Achilles and Patroclus shared a glance. 

“They will be your greatest obstacle between here and the surface,” Achilles said. “A ‘king’ of sorts and his companion, both worrisome in their own right. Do not take them lightly.” 

All the ease and lightness drained out of Zagreus. “I understand, sir. I won’t.” But suddenly the four godly gifts he’d received seemed inadequate.

He rose, contemplating a bridge farther ahead and the fields beyond it. Somewhere out there lay these “champions of Elysium,” apparently. Should Zagreus try to get to them now, while he was strong and unharmed? Should he try to find another god who might aid him first? Could he endure many more gods “aiding” him? 

Zagreus looked back down at his teacher. “Thank you for everything, sir. I think it’s time I press on.”

Achilles nodded. “Aye. And may the gods look kindly upon you.”

Zagreus wasn’t entirely sure it would be a good thing if they did.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OK, here's the deal. I'm going to put out a chapter a week (every Monday) for the duration of January. That will allow me to finish this story up. I'm not in any particular rush, but I've managed to get a little ahead on writing this, so I figure I might as well put it out there. 
> 
> **Next time:** Another duo of gods. But the trial they want is not what Zagreus expects.
> 
> \-- 
> 
> I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/purplebookcover) (18+ please).
> 
> I respond to every comment. Thank you, friends!


	9. (Interlude) Artemis and Demeter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Artemis and Demeter have boons for Zagreus, but he doesn't have to earn them the way he expects. 
> 
> Thanatos shows up to help.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love the HC of Artemis being ace, so her chapter is an interlude.

Zagreus took a deep breath. “OK,” he said. “Let’s do this.”

Two orbs of light awaited him, one green, one white. He braced. Another duo. And he doubted they’d be as kind and caring as Achilles and Patroclus. 

He reached for the green first, heeding the summons of the god within. The light flared. Zagreus put up his hands to block the flash of illumination. When it subsided, a slim, small woman awaited him.

“Hey there, Zagreus.”

“Lady Artemis,” he said. 

The lithe huntress twirled an arrow idly between her fingers. She looked outfitted for a hunt, with leaves still in her hair and a smudge of dirt on one arm. And she hardly paid Zagreus any mind.

“So, uh, I was just...” Zagreus tried.

“Hm?” She regarded him at last, eyes keen and sharp. 

“I was just wondering how we should … uh … you know, proceed with...” He waved at nothing.

Artemis’s eyebrows shot up. “Excuse me?”

“I was hoping you might gift me a boon, Lady Artemis, to aid me on my journey,” Zagreus said. “I am not sure how you’d like me to earn it, but I am amenable to whatever you might desire in that regard.”

Artemis blinked rapidly. The arrow stopped spinning between her fingers. 

“I-if there’s anything I could do for you, my lady,” Zagreus said, “you need only ask. I … am not unfamiliar with how the gods give their boons.”

“You’re serious?” she said.

“Yes, Lady Artemis, of course.” Zagreus kept his head slightly bowed throughout all this, waiting for the goddess’s judgment.

“By the nymphs, you’re actually serious.” 

Zagreus looked up cautiously. “Is there a problem, Lady Artemis? I’m sorry if I offended you. I surely didn’t mean any—”

Artemis nudged the white light beside her. “Demeter, get out here. Your grandson is propositioning me.”

White light flared so brightly Zagreus’s eyes watered. When it subsided, a regal woman stood beside Artemis, resplendent in her snowy white raiment. 

“Zagreus,” Demeter said, “is this true?”

Zagreus backed up a step. The two goddesses faced him, each more terrifying than the other. 

“L-lady Demeter,” he said, “I didn’t mean to offend. It is merely that when I’ve met other gods they all demanded a, uh, a tribute, of sorts, in exchange for their aid.”

“A tribute,” Artemis said.

Demeter pressed her lips into a tight line. “Yes,” she said, “they would. Uncouth, pleasure-seeking children that they are, I’m sure they saw your struggle as an opportunity for a bit of fun for themselves. How uncivilized.”

“Gross,” Artemis said. “I don’t even want to know what they made you do, Zagreus. I seriously don’t want to know. We heard more than enough about it up on Olympus.”

“And saw it,” Demeter said.

Artemis shivered. “Yeah, no need to remind me. Lernie? _Lernie?_ Zagreus, honestly, what did you think you’d get from a bone hydra?”

“I didn’t really get a choice on that one,” Zagreus said.

“Even so,” Artemis muttered.

“Be that as it may,” Demeter cut in, “we’ve no such use for you.”

Zagreus glanced between the goddesses, one stately and straight-backed, the other muttering to herself and picking at her nails. 

“Truly?” he said. “Then, uh, I mean, may I still receive your aid in some way? I am told the champions of Elysium lie just ahead and that they are foes to be feared. I don’t want to face them until I’m sure I’m ready. I must get past them. I must reach the surface.” 

Demeter held up a hand and Zagreus clapped his mouth shut. 

“Yes, yes, we understand,” Demeter said. “We will aid you.”

Zagreus’s chest swelled with sudden hope. “You will? Thank you. Truly, thank you. You’ve no idea—”

“It will not be free,” Demeter cut in.

The hope deflated. Something cold sank down, down, down through Zagreus, chilling even his feet. “What must I do?” he said.

“Oh, it’s not that bad,” Artemis said. “We just have a more practical trial in mind.”

“Our gifts are worthless if you lack the skill to wield them,” Demeter said.

Zagreus wasn’t sure what that meant. Then patches of grass began to glow – gold, this time, in contrast to the blue-green all around him. Shades oozed up out of the golden circles, brightswords and butterfly balls and flamewheels. More and more kept coming, filling the chamber. Zagreus readied his spear, but there were enemies on every side and the goddesses were still summoning.

“Good luck, Zagreus,” Artemis said. “Maybe if you’re not completely bloody after this we’ll help you out, got it?”

“Fight well,” Demeter said.

The goddesses disappeared with a pop and a flash of light. Zagreus clutched Varatha. The shades descended. 

They fell like hail – well, like what he presumed hail was like. He’d read about it once and asked Achilles to verify the accuracy of the account. Tiny, painful little balls of ice pinging to the ground, falling hard and fast. That’s what these shades were like as well, when the goddesses left and they rushed in to attack. 

Zagreus dashed away. Only Athena’s shield protected him from the first flamewheel that exploded in a shower of fire. 

He did not get much time to rest. The other flamewheels squealed at the death of their companion and raced after Zagreus. 

He had to dash and dash, never stopping for long. Flamewheels exploded. Sparks and fragments of chariots flew. And they were not the only enemies he had to contend with.

The brightswords did not ignore him simply because the flamewheels chased him. Any time Zagreus paused to catch his breath, a brightsword was there, stabbing and slashing. They threw him off-balance more than once, leaving him far too close to an exploding flamewheel. 

Zagreus shouted and jumped back, but the shrapnel hit his legs and side as he turned away. It bit, but it didn’t seem like it did any actual damage. Perhaps he simply couldn’t tell because he never stopped.

But the worst ones were the butterfly balls.

Zagreus largely avoided the jabs of the brightswords and explosions of the flamewheels, but the butterfly balls snuck up on him regardless, a silent, relentless pursuer. Sometimes Zagreus forgot about them entirely. Then he’d leap forward to avoid a sword and run headlong into a flurry of butterflies that prickled and tingled along his skin. The insects seeped into his body like water soaking the banks of the Lethe. When it settled inside him it burned like fire in his blood. It was a sickness, a poison, and every time Zagreus hit another cluster of butterflies it only got worse.

He stumbled, bracing against a wall and clutching at his chest. Athena’s shield could not protect him from the butterflies that had invaded his body. Every beat of his heart pushed the foulness through his blood, eroding him from within. 

And still the flamewheels and brightswords charged. He couldn’t stop them, weakened and leaning against a wall for support as he was. Soon they’d crash into him, a breaking wave, and he’d fall into that river he knew best – the Styx. 

The room flashed green before his enemies ended his escape. For a moment, Zagreus thought it was Artemis. Perhaps she’d taken pity on him and was acknowledging that her trial was simply too difficult to conquer. 

Then he heard a voice. 

“Get up, Zag.” 

Zagreus straightened, his ailments forgotten as he searched the dimming brightness for the source of that voice. 

Thanatos floated before him, his back to Zagreus, his scythe in hand. The brightswords and flamewheels paused, held at bay by the mere presence of the God of Death. 

“Than,” Zagreus said.

“Save it,” Thanatos snapped. “Get up and fight. Don’t let me waste me time here.”

Thanatos dashed into motion. In one quick swipe, a butterfly ball dissipated in a burst of pink. Clumps of butterflies dropped limp to the grass. Thanatos swept toward the other two, a flash of gray amid all these bright, scorching colors. If the butterflies harmed him, he made no indication of it, flying right through them to drive his scythe through the pink balls where they originated. 

Zagreus jerked into motion only when he heard the squeal of a flamewheel. It was far too tempting to watch Thanatos at work, to watch him moving with deadly, precise grace, horrifyingly beautiful as he reaped destruction throughout the chamber. 

But Zagreus had no time to admire him, not right now. He hefted his spear and dodged through a flamewheel. It exploded behind him as he drove Varatha through a brightsword, sending the hero back to their death. 

The poison inside him edged every motion with sharp pain, but Zagreus pushed on regardless, refusing to relent. Thanatos kept on working as well, even when the butterfly balls were gone and nothing remained but lifeless insects soaking into the grass. Together, they sliced through every obstacle Artemis and Demeter had summoned, until nothing stirred in the chamber but their panting breaths. 

Thanatos still had his back to Zagreus. He started to drift away and Zagreus ran to catch up.

“Wait, Than, please,” Zagreus said. “Please just wait.”

Thanatos paused, but he did not turn to face Zagreus. 

“Than,” Zagreus said. “Thank you for coming here.”

Thanatos’s shoulders jerked upward. Perhaps a shrug. Perhaps mere annoyance.

“I wouldn’t have made it through this without you,” Zagreus said. “I know you’re probably not happy with me right now, but I’m doing it, I’m getting out of here. I’m closer and closer every moment. It won’t be long until I reach the surface and then--”

“I couldn’t find you.” 

Thanatos’s voice struck the echoing air of the chamber like a slap to Zagreus’s face. It was loud, louder than Zagreus had ever heard him, and sharp as the blade of his scythe, honed to a keen, biting edge by eons of hurt. 

That hurt dug right into Zagreus’s chest, sharper than any pain the brightswords and butterflies might have inflicted. Thanatos still did not face him, but Zagreus took a tentative step closer, reaching out.

Thanatos whirled and Zagreus withdrew his hand. Golden eyes blazed brighter than any surface sun Zagreus could fathom. 

“I couldn’t find you,” Thanatos said. “Do you understand?” 

Zagreus swallowed. Thanatos’s brows were drawn in close, his lips bloodless and thin, pressed tight. And he was crying, silent tears that slipped down his cheeks in blunt statements of pain. 

“Than, I’m so sorry—”

Thanatos grabbed the front of Zagreus’s chiton, yanking him close, shaking him as he yelled in Zagreus’s face. “I searched everywhere. The whole underworld. I asked the Olympians. I asked Meg. And I couldn’t find you. I thought-I thought you were gone. Not just dead. Gone. Gone forever. Maybe you’d reached the surface and would never come back. Maybe … maybe it was even worse than that.” 

Zagreus set a hand over Thanatos’s. “I wasn’t gone. I’m not leaving.”

“You are!” Thanatos said. “You are.” He huffed out a breath. “And that’s fine. That I can accept. Almost. But this was something else. You were _gone_ , Zag. Do you understand?” 

“I’m sorry, Than,” Zagreus said. “I didn’t mean—”

“You don’t _mean_ to do anything,” Thanatos said. “You’re just running around blindly and hoping for the best and I—”

He cut himself off, clenching his teeth. The tears had stopped, but Than’s eyes were no less bright.

“What, Than? What is it?” 

He shoved Zagreus away. “I just have to watch.” 

He drifted away, rising up before Zagreus could catch him. Still, Zagreus ran after him. “Wait, Than. That’s not true. You’re here now, right? We can talk. It must have been Lernie. Poseidon said they lost track of me for a while there and it was this whole thing with this venom and I really didn’t—”

“Save it,” Thanatos said. He loomed over Zagreus, out of reach. “It doesn’t matter what the cause was, does it?” 

“Than,” Zagreus said. 

He watched every motion of Thanatos’s back, waiting for the inevitable moment when he left, perhaps never to appear before Zagreus again. But instead of leaving, Thanatos turned and drifted back down. Zagreus held absolutely still as Thanatos banished his scythe and paced over the grass. He strode right up to Zagreus, slipping a hand along his jaw. 

“Do what you have to do,” Thanatos said, “but don’t disappear like that again. I can sense you on the surface, but there … wherever you were … I can’t stand that again. Meg too. You’re lucky I’m the one who came here.”

Zagreus put his hand over Thanatos’s. They were so close now their voices dropped to a whisper. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m so sorry. For all of this. I don’t know what Lernie did, but that doesn’t even matter. This whole … thing...”

“Don’t,” Thanatos said. “I told you before, don’t apologize when you aren’t sorry.” 

Before Zagreus could protest he swept in, lips cool and familiar against Zagreus’s mouth. The familiarity of that kiss ached in Zagreus’s chest like a scar torn open. He chased Thanatos’s mouth when he withdrew, but Thanatos stepped away. 

He looked like he might say more, but the room was filling with clashing light. They would not be alone much longer. Zagreus assumed it was Artemis and Demeter, but there was one more, not so much a light as a lack thereof, a dark pit brimming with starlight. It made Zagreus’s head swirl just to gaze at that void. 

“A summons from Master Chaos,” Thanatos said. “You’d be wise to heed it. They are older than any of us. When they call, you arrive.” 

Zagreus didn’t care about any of that, not right now. He chased after Thanatos, but Than just drifted higher, out of reach. 

“Than, wait,” Zagreus said. 

Thanatos just shook his head. He might have smiled, just a little, but then he vanished in a flash of green. 

Zagreus watched the place where he’d been, refusing to turn away even long after Thanatos left. Demeter and Artemis approached from behind, but he did not turn to greet them. 

“Looks like you survived,” Artemis said. “Good enough, I guess.” 

“Do not be discourteous, young Zagreus,” Demeter said.

At her icy tone, he reluctantly turned, but he could not summon any words, not even a request for the aid he’d just earned. His throat was clogged, heart weighing heavy in his chest. 

“There, there, Zagreus,” Artemis said. “It couldn’t have been that bad. You look alright. Continue your hunt. And have this while you do it. Every time you attack, I’ll be there beside you and attack as well. Twice the power – and my arrows always fly true.” 

“I shall not be so flashy,” Demeter said. “Young Zagreus, in your hour of most dire need, you may call upon me and I will come to unleash winter’s wrath. Do not make this call lightly. I am not here for your every whim. You may summon me but seldom.” 

Zagreus nodded, numb and hollow, despite the heaviness weighing him down. Still, these were goddesses and they’d just given him their gifts. He forced out his thanks. 

“Don’t be weird about it, Zagreus,” Artemis said. “It’s not that big a deal. Yikes.” She vanished in a flash of light the next moment.

Demeter snorted a wry laugh. “Forgive Lady Artemis. She may scorn overt affection, but she quite likes you if she came all this way.”

“Thank you,” Zagreus said. He could think of little else to say. It hardly mattered.

“Zagreus.” Demeter’s voice chilled him to his core, sharp and biting as a winter wind. 

He looked up, met her piercing gaze. 

“Do not slouch and grumble,” Demeter said. “The gods of Olympus have seen fit to aid you in ways large and small. Do not disgrace our gifts by tossing them aside in order to pout over a broken heart. You embarked on this quest. You dishonor us – and him – if you set it aside now.” 

Zagreus nodded, incapable of answering with speech. Demeter held his gaze a moment longer, then she too vanished, just another burst of light flashing in and out of this strange adventure. 

He turned toward the black void that had opened up in the grass. It hissed and murmured. Zagreus almost thought he could hear it whispering to him. 

He stepped closer. Thanatos said it was a summons from Master Chaos and he ought not ignore it, but when Zagreus peered over the lip of the hole all he saw was nothingness, endless, endless nothingness. Unlike Lernie’s version, however, it did not scare him. Perhaps he had nothing left he truly feared. Perhaps he was just hollowed out after talking to Thanatos.

_Come, son of Hades._

Zagreus flinched when the void spoke to him. It was one voice and a thousand voices all at once, a little like Nyx but so, so much more. He knew instantly that he could not disobey. Thanatos was right. Demeter was right. Meg was right. He had to keep going and for whatever reason his path now led here, into this whispering eternity of swirling constellations. 

He took a breath, let out the tension knotting up his shoulders and clutching his heart, and stepped into the void.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updating weekly through January! 
> 
> **Next time:** It's time to meet Master Chaos.
> 
> I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/purplebookcover) (18+ please).
> 
> I respond to every comment. Thank you, friends!


	10. Chaos

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zagreus meets Master Chaos. Or maybe he doesn't. It's hard to tell.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter gets weird. I don't even think any of this is particularly sexy. It's just ... Chaos stuff. I promise it gets sexy again next week.
> 
> Also _I'm sorry for the crazy font please don't hate me I thought it was cool_

Zagreus plummeted through darkness. Or perhaps he floated. Direction came unmoored in the inky darkness flecked with errant freckles of starlight. 

His chest ached. Crossing into this realm, plunging himself into the portal Master Chaos opened for him, had torn through him like claws. Zagreus wasn’t bleeding, not as far as he could tell, but his whole body shuddered from the jolt of stepping into this strange space.

It wasn’t like the House. It wasn’t like Tartarus or Asphodel or Elysium, either. This was a space apart from all other space, a space apart from time, direction or space itself. It was nothing, yet it brimmed with the lifeblood of every realm of reality: underworld, surface and Olympus alike. 

The fall or rise stopped. Zagreus found himself on a stone platform, an L of cool, solid gray. Pots sat in clusters between columns. Zagreus could trace the seams between the stone with his toe. The universe beyond steadied, a whirl of stardust and silvery light with purple and pink and blue blushing beneath the surface. 

Yet it all felt horribly false somehow. Even as Zagreus padded across the stone, listening to the soft slap of his feet, the whole thing seemed to shift. It was like knowing he was in a dream but not being able to wake from it. The stone beneath him felt real. His chest certainly hurt. When he breathed, air filled his lungs. But he could not believe in any of it.

Welcome, son of Hades.

Zagreus startled, spinning around. The voice – voices, really, for a dozen or a hundred or more overlapped each word – came from everywhere all at once. The speaker could have been inside Zagreus’s head or right under his foot.

I am pleased you heeded my summons.

A patch of the universe shifted. The silvery starlight gathered to smooth gray, the same odd coloration as Nyx’s skin. The being that rose before Zagreus filled his vision for a moment, but when he blinked they seemed no larger than an ordinary mortal. 

They walked toward him. The starlight passed right through them, except in the places where bright red blooms splotched their skin like beautiful poison. A mantle of heads hung about them like a cloak, all the way down to their feet. Wings extended from their head, which was crowned with a golden halo. 

They stopped a few steps from Zagreus as though letting him adjust to their presence. Zagreus needed the time. Light warped around them like oil writhing on the surface of a pool of water. Purple and blue and red dripped and oozed around them, sliding over and through them. It was like looking at a stained glass window melting before his eyes. It left Zagreus dizzy. 

“Master Chaos?” he said.

That is correct.

Zagreus swallowed. “I-I am honored you would summon me, Master Chaos, but I do not know what I could possibly do for you. I am just an ordinary god.” 

A sound rippled through that place, like a note humming through the entire universe, rattling the foundations of reality.

We have already met, son of Hades. There is no one I have not met, no one I do not know. I knew of you before you existed, you and all the rest.

“I-I see, Master Chaos. That is...” What in all the underworld was he supposed to say? The realm around him made the inside of Lernie’s mouth look like a cozy cottage on the surface. This – this was something else entirely, a realm outside the reckoning of even the gods and ruled by a being older than any of them.

Do you know, son of Hades, of the eternities I spent in this place, alone but content, knowing the weavings of the universe before such a place existed, knowing even that some day you would come here and we would speak thus?

“I … can’t say I do, Master Chaos.”

Naturally, you do not, but it is amusing that you should consider answering otherwise. Tell me of your quest, son of Hades, that I might ponder it anew. Respond.

“It-it surely isn’t of much interest to you, Master Chaos,” Zagreus said. “I seek to reach the surface and speak to my mother. She left the House of Hades some time ago.”

You wish to know why, but the hearts of others are a fickle thing to presume to know. You believe your greatest obstacle is your father, but that is a precarious misconception.

“I, uh...”

Consider, son of Hades.

Chaos went silent, standing so still Zagreus thought he might be viewing a statue. They did not blink, did not breathe, did not move at all. And they looked content to stay that way forever. 

Zagreus had little choice. He sat down on the stone at Chaos’s feet and he … considered. 

He’d always assumed his father was the source of all his problems. It was Hades who told him he couldn’t leave, Hades who wouldn’t explain anything about his mother, Hades who threw shades and beasts in his way as he struggled toward the surface. 

But, in truth, it wasn’t Hades who hurt him. 

When he thought about his plan, when a pang of regret stabbed through his chest, it wasn’t because of Hades. 

It was Than. It was Meg. It was the uncertainty of whether his mother would even want to see him and the doubt about whether he’d have to leave people he cared about behind forever to get the answers he sought. 

_The hearts of others,_ huh? Yet it was his own heart that ached when he stopped running at a frantic pace and thought too hard about what he was doing. 

He looked up. Chaos was still absolutely frozen, like marble with oil dripping down it. 

“Master Chaos,” he said, “what should I do?”

You ought to do exactly as you have, son of Hades. You ought to continue, lest the pain you inflict be for naught.

 _Don’t apologize for something you aren’t sorry about._ Thanatos’s voice rang in his head and scratched like claws down his back. 

“Is that why you called me here?” Zagreus said. “Just to make me feel worse?”

Master Chaos’s head turned, slowly, and they peered down at Zagreus. One eyebrow lifted in such a human gesture it almost dispelled all the strangeness of this encounter.

Of course not, son of Hades. You do not desire wisdom that does not confirm your mission. What a very mortal habit.

Zagreus calmed himself with a breath. “I meant no offense, Master Chaos.”

Again, that echoing laughter rippled through the realm like waves jarring a pool.

You do not have the ability to offend me, son of Hades. Offense is a relationship and as yet we have no such bond. You are a pebble fallen into my hands, a shell collected on the shoreline. I place you on display now for my own amusement.

Zagreus wasn’t really following the strange, disjointed trail of Chaos’s speech anymore. He felt oddly light, like he might start floating or falling again.

I wish for you to consent to share your experiences with me, that I might find entertainment in encounters too small for my comprehension. Do you assent, son of Hades? Speak.

“I … suppose?”

Very well, son of Hades. Do not be afraid. No harm will come to you.

Chaos stepped close, looming over the sitting Zagreus even in their shrunken form. The mantle of heads murmured and whispered; Zagreus dared not look at them. The thought of any one of those heads so much as blinking churned his stomach with nausea. 

Chaos leaned down. Cool, remarkably ordinary hands slipped along Zagreus’s face. They tilted his head up, forcing them to look directly into their eyes. 

The purple was brighter here, an actual color and not the mere suggestion of one. It reminded Zagreus of the purple Nyx so often wore, deep and rich, cool and hot at once. It was a whole galaxy of colors, shades and hues from all over the spectrum contained under a deceptively simple moniker: Purple. So simple, yet Zagreus fell deeper and deeper the longer he looked at it. 

Athena came first. Zagreus gasped when something clamped around his cock, an echo of that cage she’d put him in. This time, however, it wasn’t so tight and urgent. And it wasn’t golden. It was purple, a violet latticework that swelled to fit as his cock stirred. How strange that it should both be snug and accommodating. He remembered something very different, yet when he looked down he was sure the cage was real. 

Something was between his legs, a thousand, a million somethings. It might have been flickers of light, like dust wafting through a beam of illumination, except that it prickled, dancing across his suddenly bare skin. When had his clothing vanished? Perhaps he’d never worn it at all. What use was clothing in Chaos’s void? 

Zagreus rocked back, yet he did not fall. He merely … was. Half-sitting, half-lying down, the stone beneath him gone, evaporating like the last tendrils of a fading dream. 

He reeled as he had from Dionysus’s drink, head swirling with intoxication. This was not so heavy and urgent, though. It carried him along a current. It did not make him drunk so much as it merely … shifted his perspective. The space around him was real – and a total fabrication. He lolled back into a safe, welcoming cradle. It could have been Chaos’s hands, but then, who was stroking his cock, making it push up tight against that purple latticework enclosing it? How were they even doing that with the cage there? 

He laughed. He knew it probably sounded drunk, but if Chaos was still present they did not seem to care.

“Wow,” he breathed. “Wow, that is really nice.” He wasn’t sure if he was talking about the cage or the hands at his back or the intoxication or all of it.

I am pleased, son of Hades.

Even that voice felt nice now, like a whole choir singing only for him, like Orpheus’s beautiful songs condensed into a single perfect note made for his ears and no one else’s. How did he not realize before how lovely all those overlapping tones truly were? 

Something sharp bit through the pleasant haze. Zagreus tasted iron in his mouth, but it did not burn, not the way it did when Ares cut open his body to view his blood. It came willingly this time, coaxed out at Master Chaos’s summons, and Zagreus did not fight its flow.

It truly is red. A thing I knew, of course, yet it is another matter to witness it.

The words floated outside Zagreus, a whole chorus of singing voices lovely to overhear. He rocked in the current pulling him along, entirely at its mercy. This wasn’t merely submitting as he had to Athena; this was every bit of his being giving up its secrets.

Ah, I see. How fascinating, son of Hades.

Aphrodite arrived, a heady perfume that transformed the very air of the void. Individually, each god had been overwhelming and huge, but now some sheen or barrier buffered Zagreus’s experience. 

_They’re watching,_ he realized. Yes, hands cradled him, fingers kneaded his shoulders, something stroked and encased his cock, yet the truth of each sensation lay behind a wall of memory. Chaos was merely observing Zagreus’s experiences, plucking curiously at the strands in Zagreus’s mind, reconstructing bits and pieces that interested them and setting aside the rest.

Thus, even as Zagreus groaned, rocking into the hand pumping his cock, gasping from the phantom feel of tongue and lips on his neck and chest, he did not tremble or fear. There’d be no point, really. 

Even when Chaos prodded at the memory of Lernie, it almost came as a relief. Zagreus tasted the strange venom, but it did not tear away his senses this time. It seeped through him and left a pleasant numbness, easing the wild high of Aphrodite and Dionysus’s combined effect, soothing the pain and pressure of Ares and Athena’s attentions. 

And then he realized. This was not like those gods at all. If Zagreus really had to choose, this was actually the most similar to … to Hypnos. 

It was a waking dream, a tunnel of night that edged toward the brief deaths Zagreus experienced each time he fell into the Styx. 

Zagreus didn’t know if his eyes were closed, if he truly slept, or died, but color burst before him, drops of paint on that black, speckled canvas all around him. Chaos murmured observations in his ear. And just as with Hypnos, Zagreus lost track of his body, slipping out of its confines, observing the sensations from afar. 

He still felt the heat, the pressure building up inside him, the sharp crackles of pleasure as it mounted. Chaos had a thousand hands and a million mouths and they all sought to bring Zagreus to his bliss. Anywhere Zagreus looked, he found Chaos’s meticulous, dissecting focus on him. The pressure wrapped tight around his cock. The flutter of his throat. The quivering shudder of the tense nerves along his rim. It was all Chaos, and it was all a dream, the work of the shadows of the gods Zagreus had encountered up until this point. 

It edged toward pain suddenly. Zagreus jerked and every nerve wept with stimulation. It was starting to overwhelm him. He’d become saturated by the insistent current Chaos plunged him into and soon he would not be able to float. He’d sink, sink to the very bottom, lost in this realm of memory and sensation. 

The sharpness of Ares’s cuts brought him back, but only a little. His red blood smeared his chest as Chaos ran their fingers through it. Something prodded deeper, through his mouth, his ass, his nose – anywhere it might burrow through him. It delivered a jolt of pleasure, like an explosion of lightning that popped in his stomach. 

He arched and yelled, not knowing if Chaos would catch him or let him fall. It felt like both, somehow. He feared he’d die. Could the Styx find him here? Would he return to the House or be lost somewhere in the void forever?

Be at ease, son of Hades.

That voice drew him back. There was something familiar in it. Nyx and Thanatos and Hypnos and Charon and a thousand more. He reached for what he knew, plucked out the tones he remembered best, followed them like a rope back to safety.

It seems we must end here. I quite enjoyed exploring you, son of Hades. You may return to yourself. Our bargain is fulfilled.

If he came, it hardly registered. It was more like an easing of sensation, a current withdrawing to return to the sea and leave him lying still and solitary upon some shoreline. The stone returned, firm under his back. He breathed against it, feeling the way his back expanded against the solid surface. Another rope back to reality, another tether to something comprehensible.

Megaera and Thanatos worry for you. How strange, that a son of Night herself is so flustered by your visiting me. It is as though he does not understand his own nature. No matter. I shall return you to him, to all of them. Good luck, son of Hades.

Zagreus opened his eyes. The universe swirled around him. His clothing shifted against his skin as he fell and floated among purple-blue starlight.

Good luck? Odd, that a being such as myself should utter such a phrase, even for the sake of being polite. Ought I pray to a construct I created? I understand why you would, son of Hades. You shall have no need of such temperamental gods, however. I have given you my gift, not because you’ve earned it in some tangible way, but merely because it amuses me to observe your journey and thus I wish to extend it.

The voice faded. The words made little sense, less as light washed through the void, a green-blue light that did not belong. 

Zagreus’s eyes watered. He put his arm over them. It did not even feel like he was moving, yet suddenly grass crackled under his feet. 

He had to blink to clear his vision. The scorching light of Elysium burned, but eventually he picked out the marble columns and verdant hills and lacy, leaping bridges once more. 

He’d returned. And not only was the damage he’d suffered in Artemis and Demeter’s trial gone, he was stronger somehow. 

He turned in a circle and thought he just barely caught the edge of a dark, starry void sealing over itself. Zagreus breathed, enjoying the mere feel of air dragging into his lungs, of his heart beating that red blood through his body. 

Ahead, a tall ring of stone reared up, multiple tiers of columns stacked atop each other. Varatha lay at Zagreus’s feet, as though it had waited for him while he was gone. He scooped it up and headed for the arena in the distance. 

The champions of Elysium awaited.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updating next Monday!
> 
>  **Next time:** The champions of Elysium
> 
> \-- 
> 
> I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/purplebookcover) (18+ please).
> 
> I respond to every comment. Thank you, friends!


	11. The Champions of Elysium

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zagreus meets the champions of Elysium. 
> 
> They are not what he expects.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No CWs this time.

“Again, fiend,” the champion of Elysium shouted. 

A murmur rippled through the crowd. Most had slinked away, unwilling to watch any longer. One notable exception remained, an orange shade frantically waving a banner with Zagreus’s face on it. They alone approached this latest challenge with any enthusiasm at all.

Zagreus planted Varatha in the sand of the arena and sighed. “Come on, haven’t you had enough yet?”

The champion of Elysium spluttered, face flushing red. “H-how dare you, blackguard? I am _King_ Theseus of Athens. Do you dare imply—”

“Fine,” Zagreus said, hefting his spear and charging.

It was over just as quickly as the preceding five rounds. Zagreus had entered this arena with trepidation, but also with a small army worth of gods propping him up. Theseus and his quiet companion barely landed more than a scratch on him. 

Zagreus knocked Theseus to the sand. 

“Can I _please_ move on now?” Zagreus said. “I’m really not here to sully your honor or whatever it is.”

“H-how dare you!” Theseus cried, clambering back up, sand stuck to his thighs. 

“King,” the minotaur rumbled. At least Asterius had some dignity left to him. He’d conceded after that first bout, satisfied with the conclusion of a fair and honorable match.

“Asterius, he besmirches us,” Theseus said. “We cannot allow this demon to pass out of Elysium. My honor simply will not bear it.” 

“It was a fair battle and well-fought,” Asterius said.

“There can be no fair bout when—”

Theseus did not even bother finishing before launching himself at Zagreus, who promptly swatted him down into the sand. Zagreus shrugged at Asterius, very nearly apologetic, but Asterius just sighed. He waved a large hand toward the exit. 

“Please,” Asterius said. 

Zagreus nodded. This minotaur carried himself far more nobly than his regal companion. Zagreus jogged for the exit of the arena, passing under a stone arch and into the cool darkness of the halls ringing the structure. There were rooms and passageways back here, presumably for the fighters, but if anyone but Theseus and Asterius fought in that arena, Zagreus had yet to meet them. 

Now, which way was the exit? Zagreus turned around, searching for the answer. As he did, he glimpsed the arena again, where Asterius held Theseus, patting his back as the king wailed. 

Zagreus cringed. It was absolutely pathetic. Even the things Zagreus had done to get here weren’t as embarrassing as that. 

It got worse when Asterius scooped Theseus up and carried him bridal style toward the exit of the arena. Theseus put his arms around Asterius’s neck, pressing his face against the minotaur’s chest. Gods, was he crying?

Zagreus tried to turn away, but it was too late. Asterius caught him staring from the hall and walked right up to him. Gentle eyes looked down on him, not quite pleading, but asking, warrior to warrior.

Zagreus heaved a sigh. “Fine,” he said. “I’ll help.” 

Asterius easily carried Theseus away to one of the rooms lining the circular hallway. Once they entered a spacious, furnished apartment with a bed clearly made for two, he asked Zagreus to fetch water from the pitcher on the table and some clean cloths. Zagreus obeyed, questioning all the while just what in every layer of hell he was doing. 

He spared a moment to appreciate the apartment and regretted it immediately. Images of Theseus hung on every wall. Upon the desk, a stack of letters addressed to the “King of Elysium” sat neatly arrayed. The only sign of Asterius anywhere in the room was the sheer size of the bed the champions shared.

Asterius set Theseus on that bed now, speaking to him in a low rumble Zagreus couldn’t discern.

“Here,” Zagreus said, offering a cup of water and the cloths.

Asterius took them with a grateful nod, but Theseus’s eyes widened when he noticed Zagreus.

“What is _he_ doing here?” 

“King,” Asterius said in warning.

“No, friend Asterius, it is too much! Far too much. He besmirches our home.” 

“He is here to help, King.” 

Zagreus rolled his eyes. Even the way they addressed each other was too much for him to take. 

Asterius mumbled to Theseus, rubbing his shoulder, trying to calm him down. It did not seem to be working.

“Hey, I’m sure you can beat me in other things,” Zagreus said. Maybe it would help, maybe it wouldn’t; Zagreus just wanted to get out of here. 

“I can beat you in _anything_ , fiend,” Theseus said. “There is nothing at which you shall prevail.”

“Except fighting, apparently,” Zagreus muttered. He instantly regretted it as Theseus’s face screwed up in rage. “I mean – hey, I was just lucky, right? I’ve got like eight gods working for me.”

“Why the gods debase themselves in such a manner, I cannot comprehend,” Theseus said. “If this were a fair fight—”

“Yes, yes,” Zagreus said. “That’s, uh, that’s what I meant.” 

He looked to Asterius for help, but received a shrug. 

Perhaps that desperation was what drove Asterius to his next statement: “King, the, uh, the pleasure we bring each other – surely no one could compare.” 

“Could they?” Theseus howled. “How do I even know? How do I _know_ , Asterius?” He waved at Zagreus. “Perhaps he could please you better than I and you simply have never had the occasion to find out.”

Zagreus put up his hands. “Uh, hey, whoa, flattered, but I really think you’ve got it wrong this time.”

Theseus clutched at Asterius’s chiton. “I must know, my friend. I must be sure. Otherwise … otherwise how can I trust that our hearts are true?” 

Asterius gazed down at the desperate man in his arms and Zagreus flushed with cold dread. The way they looked at each other, gazes lingering and intent, the way the clung to each other, the way their eyes turned to Zagreus... 

“I must know for certain,” Theseus said.

“Please,” Asterius said. 

Zagreus just stood there blinking. “You can’t be serious right now. I make it all the way through the underworld only to...” He sighed for what felt like the hundredth time. “If I do this, I pass freely, you got that? I stroll out of here and neither of you lift a damn finger to stop me.” 

“A fair bargain,” Asterius said. Theseus scowled and looked like he wanted to protest, but Asterius just placed a meaty finger over his lips. “A fair bargain,” he repeated.

“Fine,” Theseus said. “It won’t matter anyway when the fiend leaves here humiliated at his inability to spark even the barest flicker of desire. It must ache so to know your visage is so foul you cannot please even your own reflection.” 

Zagreus rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah. Can we just get on with this?”

“Get on? _Get on?_ ” Theseus said. “This is not something to be _gotten on_ with. This is a delicacy of the highest order, a treasure to be cherished. Do you see, Asterius, how he already undervalues your beauty? I will show him.” 

Theseus dropped to his knees on the floor like he was chasing something. Without another word he flipped up Asterius’s chiton and stroked his cock. Gods, that thing was big. Zagreus supposed he should have expected it. Asterius was half-minotaur after all. But jeez, couldn’t he have been more man than beast where the plumbing was concerned? Zagreus didn’t know where he planned to put that thing and he shivered at the mere thought. 

Theseus stopped licking along that girthy length to snap at Zagreus. “Well, fiend. If you mean to compete, get down here and compete.” 

Zagreus was going to black out from sighing so much this day, but he fell to his knees beside Theseus, dutifully sharing space along Asterius’s cock. 

He wasn’t sure what he expected. Despite its beastly size, it was remarkably human in every other way. As Zagreus licked and sucked, he enjoyed the very ordinary reactions of the minotaur. Asterius set a hand in both Zagreus and Theseus’s hair, steadying himself as they battled for space along him. He shivered and twitched, pre-cum beading at his tip as Zagreus covered it with his mouth. Even that tasted pretty ordinary, salty and musky in a way that made Zagreus’s head light with a flush of desire.

“He is keeping you all for himself,” Theseus said. “You must not judge by this, Asterius. It is unfair.”

Theseus dragged Zagreus off Asterius’s tip, bobbing down it himself instead. That left Zagreus to go low, licking along Asterius’s sack and the base of his cock. 

Asterius rumbled like stormclouds above them, his hands tightening in their hair. Despite his quiet restraint, he nearly purred with pleasure to have two people working him at the same time. That meaty cock of his damn near demanded this sort of treatment. It’d be impossible to stuff down otherwise, though the thought of attempting it appealed increasingly to Zagreus. 

“K-king,” Asterius whimpered. 

Theseus popped off him. “Yes, you see, it is my mouth that brought you to trembling, my friend, my tongue that put that flush in your lovely face. His foulness only distracts you.”

“King, please,” Asterius said. “I—”

“Do not fret,” Theseus said, “for I am well-prepared to receive your need.” 

Zagreus drew back, sitting on his heels. For an instant, he almost hoped he might slip out of here while the champions indulged their lust, but then Theseus jabbed a finger at him.

“You,” he said. “Demon. You shall enter my mouth, that I might instruct you in the proper ways of pleasure.”

Zagreus blinked. He looked up to Asterius, who shrugged. Well, if Theseus was offering, he’d be a fool not to accept, right? 

Right? 

He wondered, even as Theseus got on all fours and moaned and cried and shouted out proclamations of endearment while Asterius slicked him up and fit that thick cock inside him. (That oil faced a Herculean task, Zagreus thought.) Theseus was panting by the time Asterius got just the head inside, his arms trembling as he propped himself up. 

Still, he roused himself to say, “Come, blackguard. I have not forgotten. I will show you the true worth of a champion. Do not hold back.” 

Zagreus walked in a daze to stand before Theseus, getting on his knees and lowering his leggings so he could fit his cock against Theseus’s mouth. Remarkably, Theseus parted his lips and let Zagreus slide in until the king was full on both ends, murmuring, eyes closed in ecstasy. 

Zagreus looked across at Asterius, who conveyed more in a nod than Zagreus had ever, ever wanted to know about Theseus and his apparent appetites, but, well, here they were.

Asterius moved, squeezing a little deeper into Theseus, who moaned in response. The sound went right up Zagreus’s cock and into his gut, winding tight. Asterius certainly wasn’t getting that whole thing into Theseus, but he made a valiant effort before drawing back to pound it in again. 

Theseus nearly shrieked, muffled though he was by Zagreus’s cock. Gods, he was just as noisy here as out in the arena. Zagreus might have wished he’d be quieter, but he was already doing all he could to effect that by keeping Theseus’s mouth stuffed full. 

Each of Asterius’s thrusts jolted Theseus forward onto Zagreus’s cock, until he was nearly gagging on it. Yet when Zagreus tried to pull back to let him breathe a little better, Theseus just chased after him, keeping Zagreus buried deep in his throat. 

The thrusts slammed harder, knocking Theseus forward with such force Zagreus was sure he hit the back of the guy’s throat at least once. But Theseus just whined and moaned and breathed through his nose, singing his pleasure all the while. Even with everything Zagreus had done during this wild escape, he’d never quite witnessed someone as cock-hungry as Theseus, someone begging for more even while skewered on both ends. What did it take to satisfy this man? 

Apparently, Asterius had that answer. He gripped Theseus by the hip, pulling him back into his thrusts now, fitting in nearly to the base of his enormous cock. Zagreus wouldn’t have believed it if he wasn’t witnessing it with his own eyes. Perhaps Elysium conferred some magical capacity for cock that Zagreus didn’t know about. 

Theseus flicked out his tongue, still not forgetting Zagreus despite everything else going on. Zagreus sucked in a sharp breath. With a flick, Theseus sent a shock shooting up Zagreus’s spine. 

Theseus pulled off Zagreus just a moment, smirking up at him despite the flush in his face and the way his body knocked forward with each pound by Asterius behind him.

“You see, fiend?” he said between gasps. “You see … truly how it is done… How a-a king … performs. You will … never compare.” 

With that pronouncement, he dipped right back down Zagreus’s dick, taking him all the way to the hilt. He swallowed around Zagreus, warmth and wetness pressing in close, wrapping around Zagreus like a guiding hand. 

Zagreus hissed between his teeth, too overcome to watch any longer. He could still feel the result of Asterius’s punishing beats, but he could not see it as he tilted his head and closed his eyes, clinging to Theseus’s hair for purchase. 

“Hhh!” Theseus murmured in triumph. At least, that’s what Zagreus assumed. Who knew what he was trying to say around the dick blocking his words?

“You’re right,” Zagreus said. “Blood and darkness, you weren’t lying. You really are the best, Theseus.” 

Theseus made some self-satisfied little noise, redoubling his efforts. He licked places Zagreus didn’t even know existed, ensuring every sensitive, trembling little secret along Zagreus’s cock got attention. Meanwhile, Asterius kept pushing him forward so Zagreus got to slap the back of his throat, driven deep.

Asterius rumbled, stormclouds about to break, and Theseus moaned. Zagreus felt a shift and opened his eyes to find Asterius hunching forward, furiously pumping Theseus’s cock as he rutted against him. 

“Hhh, hhh, hhhhh,” Theseus moaned, mouth full. Then a higher cry, a long wail sent to the heavens themselves, and Theseus’s pleasure spilled out over Asterius’s hand. 

Zagreus suspected Asterius himself was not far behind, likely filling Theseus right this moment, but he did not know for sure as sensation rampaged through him, nearly knocking him off his knees. Theseus swallowed and swallowed, clenching Zagreus close until Zagreus released inside him and down that eager throat.

Zagreus withered to the floor, legs trembling and useless. He lay on his back with his eyes closed, struggling to catch his breath. Somewhere outside him, quiet voices mumbled.

“Let him rest, King.”

“He deserves no rest.”

“I know, King, I know, but he has fulfilled the bargain.”

“He is a fiend and a demon. He shall get no quarter here.”

“Shh, King, you’re shaking.” 

Zagreus roused himself. He couldn’t listen to another damn word. Even light and quivering, he pulled up his leggings and straightened out his chiton. Asterius sat on the floor before the bed (the bed they had not, ironically enough, used at all for this little experiment) with Theseus cradled in his lap. 

Theseus glared when he caught Zagreus looking. “What, blackguard? Our bargain is fulfilled. You have experienced first hand how pathetic you are in all things compared to me. Now go.” 

Zagreus didn’t need to be told twice. He certainly wasn’t eager to hang around and get another lecture from Theseus any time soon. Still, he lingered long enough to offer Asterius a nod.

“Thank you,” he said.

Asterius just inclined his head.

“Pah! ‘Thank you.’ You shall thank us for defeating you next time you wander into these halls, demon,” Theseus said.

“Right,” Zagreus said. Frankly, he just wanted this over and done with. He scooped up Varatha and hurried out of the apartment. Before he even turned down the hall Asterius’s soothing tones rumbled over Theseus’s continued outrage.

Zagreus traversed the halls of the arena in a daze. Then, finally, he found it, an archway that led directly to a stairwell, a stairwell to the surface. 

Zagreus took a breath and ascended the stairs. This was it. He was even relatively unscathed. He was actually getting out of here. He was actually going to reach the—

He stopped short at the top, standing in a long hall that reeked of death and decay. Zagreus had never smelled such things before, but he knew them immediately, the cloying scents of life ending, rotting as it returned to the earth. 

This was not the surface.

It was close. He could even see the door, but the passageway that lay before him teemed with rats and satyrs. 

Zagreus grit his teeth and gripped his spear. No. He’d come all this way. He was _not_ going to let some damn vermin stop him. 

He charged in, dashing through the rats, letting them throw themselves at Athena’s rending shields. They died with shrieks and bursts of blood and Zagreus left them behind. His spear pierced the satyrs, Ares’s rage propelling him past their slashing claws and snapping mouths. 

By the time he reached the other end of the hall, Zagreus was covered in blood, but for once it was not his own. A field of destruction lay behind him, bodies scattered like puss leaking out of boils. 

Cerberus awaited him, panting with excitement to see his master. 

Zagreus’s heart dropped. Surely, this wasn’t required. Surely, he didn’t need to do _this_. Gods, had he come all this way only to be faced with the one challenge he could not meet?

“Hhhnnnng.”

He snapped his head to the side and found Charon in his boat, standing while Hermes lounged beside him. Hermes waved.

“Hey there, coz,” Hermes said. “A bit of a pickle, huh? Came all this way only to have to off your own dog. Youch. Would not want to be in your shoes – er, feet? – about now.”

“Hhhrrrrrnnng.”

“Fine, fine,” Hermes said. “Hey, listen, coz. We can help you out. You got any coins? The old man here is just wild for the things. He might be able to sell you something that will help.”

Zagreus dug through his chiton. Thank all the gods he’d picked up those extra coins in Patroclus’s grove. He offered them to Charon, not even sure how much he held, but the stoic boatman nodded.

“Hhhh.” 

“That means ‘swell,’” Hermes said. “Go on, take it.” 

A sack that smelled even more foul and awful than the rest of this place sat on the dock just before the boat. Zagreus lifted it, watching Charon the whole time, but he didn’t swing his oar to decapitate Zagreus. 

“Well, thanks,” Zagreus said. 

“Oh yeah,” Hermes said. “No problem. Just hurry up and get out of here, will ya? The boss owes me some overtime.” Hermes winked and Zagreus flushed. He looked to Charon, who just bowed his head so his hat covered his face. 

_You know what, I don’t even want to know._

He nodded, backing away with the sack. The moment Cerberus smelled it, he whined in delight, tail thumping on the stone floor.

“Here you go, boy,” Zagreus said. “Truce?” 

Cerberus barked, then set to work gnawing on the sack. 

Zagreus paused long enough to pet one of his heads, to press his face into the fur the way he had so many times. What if this was it? What if he never saw Cerberus again after this? The thought brought tears to his eyes that he rubbed off on Cerberus’s fur.

“You understand that I have to do this, don’t you, boy?” Zagreus said.

Cerberus did not respond, too preoccupied with his foul snack. 

Zagreus patted him, pushing away. “Gods, I hope you understand.” 

He wasn’t sure who exactly he meant that time. There were too many he’d hurt with this, too many he owed an explanation and an apology to.

But he’d made it. He was here. The exit to the underworld stood before him. Nothing barred his way – not gods, not beasts, not even his father. 

He paced to the door. Wind snuck through the crack, real wind, real air, surface air. He breathed deeply, inhaling his first scent of the surface. It was so – so _alive_. So rich and fragrant and full of _stuff_. 

Zagreus exhaled that breath and, at long last, pushed open the doors to the surface.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This fic will update one final time on Monday, Jan. 25. 
> 
> **Next time:** Zagreus reaches the surface at last. His journey is over.
> 
> \-- 
> 
> I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/purplebookcover) (18+ please).
> 
> I respond to every comment. Thank you, friends!


	12. The Surface

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zagreus reaches the surface at last.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No, he does not fuck the entire surface. Breaking with the title convention here. I can't believe this is it! After this, I'm going to dive into all those Hades one-shots I haven't been writing in order to do this. Hope you enjoyed!
> 
> Quick note: This chapter is a bit longer than the others (about 4.5K).

Beautiful.

That was too simple a description, but it was the one that came to mind the moment Zagreus set his feet upon the surface world.

Snow coated the earth. It melted before Zagreus could reach it, recoiling from his flaming feet. He got onto his hands and knees, reaching out to scoop up a chunk. He laughed at the shock of cold, actual cold. In the House, everything just … was. Asphodel was hot. Demeter was cold. But those temperatures lacked any bite, any spark. They simply existed. 

This, this chunk of snow sitting in his palm, tingling against the heat of his hand, it brimmed with life, teeming like a river full of fish. 

And under the snow – grass! Actual grass. Not that dead, crunching violet stuff in the garden back below. This was green, even resting under the snow, and when Zagreus tore out a few blades they exhaled the perfume of growing, squirming, wriggling things. 

He pressed the blades against his nose, inhaling deeply. He’d never smelled anything like it, nothing even close. It was a whole world of life, of _green_ contained in a few little blades of disturbed grass. 

“Are you going to play in the mud all day, boy?” 

Zagreus dropped his treasure, climbing back to his feet. Hades stood with his back to Zagreus, broad as a boulder blocking his path. 

“Father, stand aside,” he said. “Let me pass. I’ve conquered your realm. I’ve made it.”

Hades scoffed, crimson cloak stirring in air that was alive and moving as he turned to face Zagreus. “You have not made it until you’ve gotten past me. You want to persist in this madness, boy? Then prepare yourself. I will not make it easy.” 

Zagreus sneered, clutching Varatha. “I will send you back to the deepest reaches of your realm, Father. I’m not afraid of you.”

“Ha, I suppose you aren’t,” Hades said. “Do you believe all those gods hanging about your shoulders are enough? Meddling interlopers.” 

He did not wait for an answer before charging at Zagreus, dashing across that snowy field with unnatural speed. White flurries flew up in his wake, a fresh spray of snowfall. 

Zagreus did not get the opportunity to pause and admire it. He raised Varatha, barely parrying a thrust before flashing away from the brunt of the blow. 

For all his size, Hades was fast, incredibly fast. It was only Athena’s shield that spared Zagreus from taking more than an errant slash as he evaded the jabs and swipes of his spear. Still, he was barely returning any attacks of his own, barely managing to do more than run around through the melting snow and hide behind columns that crumbled to dust when Hades struck them. 

He got in a jab, just once. His spear pierced Hades’s side. It shouldn’t have been enough, but Ares ensured the wound festered and Artemis sent additional bolts flying and Chaos lent strength to Zagreus’s attack. 

Hades stumbled, grabbing at his side. His anger relented to surprise for a moment, then he snarled at Zagreus. 

“Is that all?” Hades said. “Is that the best they could do, all those mighty Olympians?” 

_No,_ Zagreus thought, but it wasn’t worth saying. 

He had his opening now. He knew he _could_ reach Hades and that meant there was a chance, a thin flicker of hope.

Zagreus dashed in, trusting Athena’s shield to take the worst of it. He butted Hades right in the chest with the dull end of his spear. A flash of pink light, then Hades stumbled back, touching his chest.

Zagreus nearly smiled as he watched Aphrodite wither away Hades’s defenses, plucking him apart from the inside out. 

Hades narrowed his eyes, shaking off the effect. Zagreus knew it still had to be hitting him, but Hades charged forward as though unfazed by the touch of all those various gods. Once again, Zagreus had to retreat, had to dance back and dodge and hope to miss the slashes of that deadly spear. 

Shades rose out of the earth, abominations that did not belong on this plane.

“Need them to do your fighting for you?” Zagreus said.

Hades just scoffed. It was unfair, they all knew it, but the Lord of the Underworld had never presumed to care about fairness. 

With the shades also attacking, Zagreus fell on the back foot. He simply couldn’t keep the wringers and witches and longspears at bay while also avoiding those quick jabs of Hades’s spear. Longspears caught him as he retreated. Wringers lunged at him and forced him off balance. Witches’s magic burst against him, crackling and burning along his skin. 

Zagreus fell to a knee, succumbing before the onslaught. He gripped Varatha, clutched his chest, trying to tear himself open and find some kernel of strength he’d overlooked. Even with all those gods helping him, a few shades had knocked him down, destroyed everything he’d worked for. In a moment’s time, he’d be crawling out of the Styx and Hypnos would be announcing to the entire House that he’d failed.

Cause of death: Hades. 

“Help,” he said. “Help me, please.” He spoke to no one in particular. He spoke to himself, to all those gods loitering about his shoulders, to everyone he’d left behind. 

Someone answered. 

“Cold. Bitter cold.”  
Her voice echoed through that field of snow, booming and huge, more massive even than Hades himself. The Lord of the Underworld stopped. The shades stopped. Everything froze as a vortex opened up before Hades, a whirling void of snow and ice that pelted him relentlessly. 

“They have taken from me,” Demeter said, “and now I shall take everything from them.” 

“Demeter,” Hades howled amid the storm. “Leave her out of this, boy!” 

But it was too late for that, far, far too late. Zagreus dragged himself to his feet and pulled one final gift out of his chiton, a small vial of purple liquid, Dionysus’s boon. He gulped it down. It hardly hit his stomach before a surge of renewed strength beat through him. He launched into the snowy vortex, Varatha leading the way through clawing shades and biting ice. 

Zagreus was torn bloody by the time he reached Hades, but his father fared far worse. The ice pelted Hades from every side, intent upon driving spikes right through him. It attacked with malice, with cold vengeance, with bitter intention. Zagreus strode forward and lifted his spear and drove it through the ice, through the howl of the storm and, finally, right through Hades’s chest. 

The storm dissipated in a whoosh. Ice pattered to the plain. Silence hummed in Zagreus’s ears in the sudden absence of the wind. And Hades dropped to his knees, grabbing at the spear through his chest. 

“You know not … what you do,” he said. 

Then he fell and the Styx rose to take him and Zagreus stood alone. 

For a moment, he managed to remain on his feet, likely still propped up by Dionysus. Then he too crumbled to his knees, panting in the snow strewn about him. 

It was so quiet, so incredibly quiet. Only his own breath broke the hush, puffing out white and cloudy. The snow muffled everything else, made the world still and silent. 

Zagreus’s arms trembled beneath him. He had to get up. He had to find a way back onto his feet. What good was it to defeat his father if he was going to fall here anyway? What good to come all this way only to die? 

But no matter how he screamed at his body, it did not obey. He trembled until his arms gave out, then he collapsed into the snow and rolled onto his back. 

The sky. Gods, he’d come all this way and he was only just now noticing the sky. 

That word returned, that inadequate, feckless little word. 

Beautiful. 

It was the best he could manage. He’d never learned the vocabulary of these things. The clouds were like Hypnos’s hair. He could imagine how soft they might feel if he could catch them. The blue was like Megaera’s skin and it extended on forever as far as he could see. And the sun. The sun was like Thanatos’s eyes, golden and searing and too bright for the underworld. 

A tear slipped down Zagreus’s cheek, thinking of those three, thinking of how they’d each let him go, how they’d each watched him leave. And now he lay here in the dirt, useless. 

The snow crunched. Zagreus braced. Maybe his father had recovered already and returned to finish the job. Then an even more horrible thought shook him – he was on the surface. Dying on the surface. Maybe it was Than’s job to take him. 

“Do you really mean to lie there and die?” Thanatos said.

Zagreus cringed. Gods, he was right. He was right. This was more horrible than any other fate he could have conjured. 

Then another voice, “I will drag you if I must, Zagreus.” 

He blinked, struggling to sit up. “Megaera?” 

When he turned, he found them both striding toward him. They stopped a step away, looming over him. 

“Get up, Zagreus,” Thanatos said. 

“Don’t let us waste our time,” Megaera said. 

They each offered a hand and he let them pull him to his feet. He had a dozen questions, a thousand, a million, but the one that made it to his lips first was: “How?” 

Thanatos snorted a laugh. 

“Special exception,” was all Megaera said, nodding her head at Than. “I’d suggest not fretting over the finer points. Eternity is not a concept that applies to this plane.” 

They went on holding his hands as they led him out of the grove. Zagreus walked in a daze, numb and weak. 

He forgot some of his exhaustion when they passed under an arch and onto a snowy mountain path.

“This is...” Zagreus said.

“Greece,” Thanatos said. 

“Greece.” 

Zagreus tasted the name on the very air, air so rich and full, like wine pouring down his throat. Intoxicating in its vivacity. Zagreus’s head swirled as he stood on that rocky, snowy height, his feet melting the ice, and watched the sun bleed up over the horizon. He expected red, burning, bloody red. But as the sun climbed it splashed against the sky in a riot of colors – deep, rich purple and blushing pink and warm red and quiet, silky ribbons of orange.

He did not even realize he was crying again until Megaera wiped away the tears. 

“It’s the sun,” he said. “The real sun. It’s warm. I can feel it.”

“Yes,” Megaera said, “but there isn’t much time. We must keep going.” 

He went, dragging his eyes away from that paint spilling across the horizon only because Thanatos and Megaera pulled him along. 

There was plenty more to see.

Birds flit from branch to branch. Trees swayed in stirring air. Rivers gurgled, fish splashed through glinting pools, surface creatures sprinted away at the trio’s clumsy approach. And always, always there was that smell, that exhale that only living things gave off, so big and so much and so teeming and moving, always moving, always churning, always scurrying and scraping and creating _more_ wherever it went. It was all Zagreus could do just to keep on breathing. 

They arrived at a garden.

The snow ended abruptly. That smell – it grew to bursting, so much of it Zagreus feared he would choke on it. He thought it might be the loveliest way to die he’d yet encountered. 

Flowers. He knew that word, knew that idea, knew the cold, brittle blooms in the House below, but none of it applied to what he saw now, the outrageous colors, the buttery petals, the creatures that danced from one golden pistil to the next to drink of the sun itself. 

“Who’s there?” 

Zagreus jerked his head up at the sound. A woman stood in the garden. For all appearances, she might have been mortal. Dirt smudged a sun-tanned cheek. Her long blonde braid frizzed from her labor outdoors. A basket of gardening tools hung from her elbow. 

Zagreus didn’t know what gave her away exactly. Perhaps the mere inevitability of fate. But he looked at her and with absolute certainty, he said, “Mother.”

#

They spoke for as long as they could. Megaera and Thanatos retreated while they did, gave mother and son a bit of privacy in the cottage beside the garden.

Zagreus ate little cakes made from the things she grew and saw the cot she slept on and felt the roughness of the dresses she’d sewn for herself. And he asked, over and over, “Why?” Why this. Why that. Why and why and why. 

She did not have every answer, but she had some. And, more importantly, she clasped his hands while she spoke and some of the dirt smudged onto his skin, some of that warm earth clung to him and marked him. 

When Thanatos returned, Zagreus hardly even fought it. He’d known for so long now, since that moment in the snow. He felt it, a fishhook in his chest, and knew Than had delayed as long as he could, as long as his nature allowed. 

“Mother, can I see you again?” he said. 

“I hope so,” she said. “Zagreus, I hope so.” 

She touched his face, fingers gnarled from sun and time and work. It was the last bit of the surface he felt before Thanatos took him in his arms and carried him gently down.

#

Zagreus had succumbed to the River Styx many times, but this time was different.

He expected to lurch up any moment, to rise gasping out of the water and see Hypnos sleeping down the hall, but instead he just lingered. The surface faded away like a dream dispersed by waking, but Zagreus just went on falling, sinking slowly, so slowly, as though someone was carrying him and taking their time. 

He stirred, searching for anything tangible, and found Thanatos holding him, pacing slowly through a world like only the red of the rising sun. Red everywhere. Red soaking him and Zagreus and Megaera beside him. Red in each breath. Red like blood. 

“Than,” he said. 

Thanatos looked down. “Zagreus, I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault,” Zagreus said. “You had to. My time was up, right?”

Thanatos nodded gravely. “I fear even you cannot linger overly long up there.”

“Where are we?” Zagreus said. “Where are we going?” 

“This is the river,” Megaera said, “but most do not see this section. The perks of dating the God of Death.” She smirked at Zagreus, but he could not return the smile. 

It was over. His whole journey, his whole mad adventure, and while it turned out he _couldn’t_ leave them, it was not for lack of trying. So, really, were they dating? Were they … anything? 

“Than, Meg,” he started, “hey, uh, you don’t need to help me. I-I’m all right, really.” 

Thanatos set Zagreus down. Now, he had to face both of them head on in this strange non-space between life and death, this red abyss. 

“Why did you come for me?” Zagreus said. “Why did you help me? Did you know?” 

Thanatos shook his head. “Not until you were on the surface. It’s not in my purview, not until you exited the underworld. Then I … I knew. That you wouldn’t stay.” 

“I didn’t,” Megaera said. “But when Than told me, I knew I had to join him.”

“Why?” Zagreus said. It seemed like his constant mantra now, a word he couldn’t possibly say often enough. 

Megaera sighed. Thanatos’s face went still and hard as stone. 

“I was angry,” Thanatos said. “I am angry. But...” His jaw jerked as he ground his teeth. “I understand why you did it. I understand why you had to know. I told you to keep going. I wasn’t just speaking for the sake of giving you some false hope or comfort. I meant it, Zagreus. If it was that important to you, if it was worth that much, then I wanted to see you succeed.”

“Whatever that meant,” Megaera added. “Whatever that entailed.” 

Zagreus swallowed, looking between them. “You know all I did to get here, all I had to do, all I was willing to give up. And still...” 

Thanatos just nodded. Megaera smirked.

“Still,” she said, “idiot.” 

He might have protested, but she stepped forward, cupped his face in her hands and smothered his words with a kiss. He reached for her, holding her wrists to keep himself standing. Her mouth pressed warm and firm against his and he wondered how he could have possibly contemplated losing her forever. But in the moment it had been so urgent, so consuming. 

Perhaps he’d simply been running too hard to think about it much, throwing himself from one challenge to the next so he wouldn’t have to feel the sting of loss. 

She left her hands on his jaw as she eased away. Her thumbs stroked. She smiled, watching the shock and anticipation on his face. 

“Than,” she said, “don’t leave him waiting.” 

Megaera passed him along and Thanatos caught him, sweeping him into another kiss, this one cool and light, like a breeze passing over his lips. Zagreus clutched Thanatos’s chiton to keep himself steady. He dared not wonder if this was real, if this was actually happening and real. Perhaps it was just a flash of madness as he died, some final vision to aid him on his way.

Yet Zagreus could not doubt when Thanatos pulled away and both he and Megaera set their hands on him. Thanatos kissed his shoulder and in toward his neck. Megaera dragged her fingers through his hair, a trail of tingling following in her wake. 

Zagreus closed his eyes, but the dream did not dissipate. Their hands and mouths kept moving, kept pressing little spots of heat against his skin as reminders that they were all here, all together. 

Zagreus wasn’t sure how he ended up on his back. Up and down weren’t firm concepts anymore. All he knew was that he was no longer standing and that Thanatos and Megaera lay on either side of him, their hands tangling together on his chest as they leaned over him and kissed each other. Zagreus merely observed, afraid with every blink that he’d have to watch them dissipate. How was it that he’d come all this way, done what he did, and still they were here with him like this? 

He reached for them – tucking Thanatos’s hair behind his ear, skimming his knuckles along Megaera’s cheek – and they turned their gazes to him. 

“Why are you here?” he said. “Why would you come back when I tried to leave you?” 

Megaera put a finger over his lips. “If you keep asking we may really regret it, idiot. Call it fate or luck or whatever you like. Maybe we’re all just fools who can’t escape our natures.” 

“Zag,” Thanatos said, “it doesn’t matter. We made our choices. The least you could do is respect ours.” 

That cut through his doubt, sharp as a spear point to the gut. He nodded. He owed them that trust, at least, that faith in their motivations. Then, he drew them both down to him, incomplete without their taste on his lips. 

That taste filled up the red void where they now wafted, untethered and aimless. Clothing fell away reverently, bodies bared by careful hands searching each new patch of skin revealed. The red turned them all rosy, their shoulders, their lips, their eyes. It made blushing, giddy youths of all three of them, even though they’d known each other so long and so well. 

Zagreus tasted Megaera first, lying between her legs to get his mouth on her, to swirl his tongue around the strong, familiar scent of her body. It returned in a rush, like sensation returning to a tingling limb, sharp, almost painful in its clarity. 

He jabbed his tongue out for more and her voice echoed through the emptiness, filling it with warmth and song, like those surface creatures that had chattered and chirped at Zagreus’s arrival. 

Thanatos tried to join in, to help, to lick at Zagreus while he worked, but Zagreus paused and shook his head. He put a hand on Thanatos’s chest, urging him down. Then he crawled between his legs and drew him into his mouth. 

The clash was instant and jarring. He was so much quieter than Megaera, a mellow, mild taste. Zagreus had to bob and lick and search to draw out more, to dig out some crucial essence that was purely Thanatos himself. The coolness was just a part of it, the hush, the slow, careful, deliberate revelation. 

Zagreus moaned from the loss when he dragged up off of Than, freeing his mouth. His body ached for more, but he had to do this right. He knew the proper course, the path he must tread, and from the gleam in his companions’ eyes, they knew it too. 

He slotted between Megaera’s legs, meeting her eyes as he kissed along her spread thighs. He kept his ass in the air as his head lowered, kept himself exposed and available. 

Thanatos understood. 

He rubbed a hand on Zagreus’s ass before following with his mouth, licking him open even as Zagreus did the same to Megaera. Moans gathered like clouds fogging a clear blue sky, refracting the light of that miraculous sun into a hundred different shades and hues. 

Thanatos entered with his fingers first – always so deliberate, so careful, so precise, taking each step in turn. They had no aid but their own godly natures here, but it was enough. Thanatos could open him and his body would respond, would obey. Zagreus felt the wetness already, a wish born of their mutual desire. 

He clung to Megaera as Thanatos worked, buried in her cunt. His tongue swirled and circled, finding new sweetness with every trip along her.

At last, Thanatos ceased his cautious ministrations and pushed into Zagreus. It all happened so easily, barely a stretch. Even as Zagreus’s fingers slid into Megaera, so did Than slide into him, fill him, fit into him and lock all three of them together. Together. At last, together, breaths and bodies mingling. 

Zagreus’s body slipped from between his fingers, the water of the Styx dripping back into itself, mixing with a thousand other lives, a million other deaths, all the same red hue. They moved together, moaned together, felt and rocked and cried out together, and there was no difference between one throat and the next, one chest clutching after breath and the next.

The waters rose, the grasping fingers of the river of the dead. Their bodies heated the river; their sweat mixed with the red water. Blood and darkness and death, life and punishment and the quiet stillness that lay between planes and realms – they built their own kingdom here, in the crease between realities. 

Distantly, Zagreus felt a body – his – jolting and clenching, winding tight around Than inside him and Megaera against his lips. But just as clear among the muddied mixture of sensation was the tightening of the muscles in Megaera’s gut, the sensation of warmth wrapped snug around Thanatos. In the bloody, quiet, red darkness, the borders between bodies dissolved. 

The water rose, covering their heads now, flooding down their throats and into their lungs. It could not destroy them. It could not unmake them. Not this time. It merely caught them in its current and carried them to an inevitable terminal. 

It would not be the end. Reaching the end of this river, reaching the peak of their pleasure, it would not end anything. 

There were no endings here.

#

Zagreus gasped as he awoke in the River Styx. Red streamed down his face and out of his hair. He lay on the steps leading up into the House and there beside him, hands clasped over his chest, lie Thanatos and Megaera, soaked by the river of death and life, the boundary between the surface and the underworld.

They were naked, all three of them. Some deep echo of contentment and satisfaction hummed in Zagreus’s chest. He set his hand over the ones clasped atop him. 

Thanatos and Megaera stirred, murmuring as they rediscovered their bodies. 

“We’re back,” Zagreus said.

Megaera pushed up, blinking at the House around them. Thanatos pulled himself up to sit on one of the steps, but merely watched Zagreus. 

For a while, they stayed there on the steps, watching the shades emerge from the river, listening to their stories as they passed. _I was a farmer. I was a soldier. I was a poet._

Megaera was the first to stand and leave the river, helping Thanatos and Zagreus up after her. Zagreus wobbled as he stood. He felt light and weak as a cloud with all those gods suddenly stripped from his soul. He teetered and Thanatos caught him by the shoulder.

“Are you all right?” Thanatos said.

“Yes,” Zagreus said. “It’s just been a while since I’ve been _only_ myself.”

Megaera smirked at him, bumping against his shoulder. “Make an effort to stay that way this time, won’t you?”

He wanted to promise her, wanted to reassure her, but when he thought of retreading the path he’d just taken, fighting his way to the surface again, fighting _Hades_ again, his jaw clenched.

Thanatos set a hand on his shoulder. “We will be with you next time,” he said. 

Despite all he’d been through, this left Zagreus breathless as he stood dripping onto the floor of the hall. 

“You don’t seriously believe we’re going to let you do that again?” Megaera said. “At least not without help? Please, Zagreus. I should kill you again myself for doubting us.” 

“You will not fight alone,” Thanatos said. “Never again.”

Zagreus swallowed, afraid to attempt to speak. He shook his head. This was too great a gift, too generous a boon, and he’d done nothing at all to earn it. To the contrary, he’d worked tirelessly to fall out of grace with them. 

Megaera grasped him by the chin, forcing him to look at her, squeezing hard. “Achilles is your teacher.”

“Huh?” The word burst out, freed by confusion.

“Have you never spoken to him?” Megaera said. “He gave you that spear. You got to the surface with Varatha, with _him_. Yet have you ever listened to his words?” 

“Of course I have,” Zagreus said. 

“Then you should know that what he repents for even now, what weighs his soul down, drags it into this pit, what left him unwhole and unmade, was regret.” Megaera squeezed a little harder. “He let Patroclus fight alone.” 

She released him then, but her eyes, eyes as golden as the sunrise slashing over Greece, bore into him. 

Zagreus swallowed. She was right. It was plain to see how that burden hunched Achilles, weighed him down even now, the guilt like hands still trying to pull him away from Patroclus. Zagreus would not do the same to Megaera and Thanatos. He resolved then and there that the next time he went to the surface, it would be with them.

He opened his mouth to say as much, but a whistle cut him off.

“Wowza, what have you three been up to?” Hypnos said. He peeked from under his sleep mask, eyebrows waggling. “‘Natural causes’ this time, huh, Zag? Boy, I did not think of _that_ as natural causes.” 

Zagreus tried to cover himself. Megaera strode furious toward Hypnos. Thanatos narrowed his eyes and grumbled. And the cycle began anew, right back where it had started. Only this time, Zagreus was not alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Zagreus has fucked his way to freedom. Congrats, little buddy. 
> 
> I hope you enjoyed this story. I know it took some twists and turns that weren't for everyone, including in this final chapter. I just wanted to explore a weird idea and incorporate as many characters as I could. It's been massively fun. Thank you so much for coming along! 
> 
> I'm in a bunch of fandoms, but in terms of Hades, for me, the future is looking like Hyp/Than one-shots, primarily. So if you are into my problematic ship, consider joining me in kicking that dead tag to life. (Ironically?) 
> 
> Anyways, thank you either way! This fandom is fucking stacked with talent so I am very flattered that folks enjoyed my weird little take on the whole ordeal. 
> 
> \--
> 
> I'm on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/purplebookcover) (18+ please).
> 
> I respond to every comment. Thank you, friends!


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